<p>I am an International and have shortlisted Rice and UCLA as these three choices out of my 16 acceptances. I want to pursue career in Computer Science. Pl give me your opinion for me to make my mind. I can not visit any of these colleges as of now.</p>
<p>Sigtus, I think UCLA and UCB would be the best choice if you don’t have MIT or Stanford. Forget about RICE from CS stand point they will never be a match in next 20 years.</p>
<p>DavNeil do you have a crystal ball or something? “Forget about RICE from CS stand point they will never be a match in next 20 years.” - That comment was just asinine. Especially considering it’s already ranked #20 in CS, and the fact that Texas & Rice are doing quite well in this economy while California is broke & getting worse. 20 years into the future is a lot of room for things to get much better for Rice & much worse for CA in general.</p>
<p>Sigtus - Please look up the CS thread on Rice. It is probably page 2, possibly page 3. Rice’s CS department is not the size of the other schools, but then neither is the student body. The department is strong and is only getting stronger.</p>
<p>You do need to look at the research being done in your area of interest at these schools and look at the curriculum, to see if it matches your interests.</p>
<p>Do these schools all cost the same for you?</p>
<p>Another thing, Rice has a larger endowment than BOTH UCB & UCLA, which in turn have 5-6 times as many students as Rice does…so which students do you think have it better?</p>
<p>I really don’t understand why you would pay essentially as much to go to UCLA when you have the opportunity to come to Rice. You would be paying to attend a school in a declining state where you will get less attention and have a worse undergraduate experience. The program here is small, but the students get a very large amount of attention and are very heavily recruited by all the leading companies. I have friends in CS who have gotten some excellent offers for summer internships from Google, Microsoft, etc. I would come here unless there is some financial incentive to go to any of the other two schools you listed. Also, if you change your mind, don’t forget that it is much easier to change your major here at Rice than those public schools. Good luck!</p>
<p>Whoever said Rice’s CS program won’t match up for twenty years clearly has absolutely no idea what they’re talking about. The computer science department is one of the best ones at Rice, and is EXTREMELY respected by companies and graduate programs. I definitely feel like my professors care about me and not solely about their research. I’m learning a lot; certainly more than my CS friends at other “top tier universities.”</p>