RPI - Northeastern

Colleges and Universities A-Z Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
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<p>Hey, I'm kinda new to this site, but I have a decision that needs a lot of going over-- I have right now narrowed down my choices for college to RPI and Northeastern University, and I want to know which one would be better for a computer science major.</p>

<p>Assuming:</p>

<p>-Scholarship amounts are fairly equal for both
-I got into Honors program for NEU
-I'm hoping to do a dual major of computer science with some other field
-A social life (or lack thereof) doesn't really matter to me much
-Seeking mainly which one could get better job opportunities after college</p>

<p>Thanks!</p>

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<p>Last year I was accepted to RPI and Northeastern and those were pretty much my top choices as well. Some things I took into account were location, academic options, cost, career potential, time to graduate, and diversity. I probably wouldn't have chosen RPI if I could go back but it's up to you.</p>

<p>Location: Troy vs. Boston
-Boston wins.</p>

<p>Academic Options: both have CS programs
-Northeastern will give it to you with a liberal arts spin
-RPI will give it to you with an Math/Science/Engineering spin</p>

<p>Cost: probably about the same for both schools in your case</p>

<p>Career potential: both great.
-RPI places so much emphasis on career placement from the start of your college career. They're known for getting people really great jobs.
-Northeastern has a VERY well-known co-op program that gets people great jobs as well.</p>

<p>Time to graduate: averages...
-RPI 4 years
-Northeastern 5 years (because of co-op program)</p>

<p>Diversity:
-RPI 27% females and 78% white
-Northeastern 51% females and 70% white</p>

<p>Other: You got into the Honors program at Northeastern! There will be a lot of benefits there because of that, including extra respect! That should be a pretty big factor.</p>

<p>Let me know which one you choose if decide any time soon!
-Dan</p>

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<p>Thanks Dan-- Looks like Northeastern has more advantages at this point, Honors Program, location, co-op, and cost (its only cheaper by a little). RPI, with the more math/science/engineering oriented computer science, would appeal more to me though. I'll be visiting both campuses over the next weekend, so I'll be able to decide soon hopefully.</p>

<p>Plus that 5 years vs 4 years doesn't make too much of a difference for me, I skipped one grade during high school, so 5 years means that I'll be graduating college at the same time as some of my original high school class.</p>

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<p>yup no problem.</p>

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<p>Just replying to Dan now, I chose Northeastern after visiting both campuses.</p>

<p>Seems that RPI has a very powerful supercomputer on campus, which is a plus, but Northeastern has a nice computer science building and facilities. Location and the fact that NU has the buildings more close to one another was an important factor as well.</p>

<p>Again, thanks Dan for your aid in helping me decide.</p>

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<p>Seeing as it's a little too late to sway you Ireul I will post for the other side of the spectrum, as dsilva has been putting the negative spin on RPI's education, so I will throw in my point of view:</p>

<p>what's most important is your major, and RPI is 2nd to MIT on the east coast. the COMPSCI major at RPI is going to give you a most in-depth perspective, and more comprehensive than NEU hands down.</p>

<p>as far as duel majoring and minoring, RPI has lotsss in the math/eng/sci field as dsilva mentioned, and a great business school. Depending on what you'd like to major/minor in what RPI DOES offer is better than NEU. As far as humanities minoring/majoring I'd say NEU is a better bet.</p>

<p>As far as Troy/Boston that all depends. Troy is actually really nice, manageable city, where as boston is bigger. You will probably stay in boston if you go to NEU because of all the job opportunities there, and at RPI you can go wherever you would like. </p>

<p>companies recruit HEAVILY at RPI, especially for the math/science/comp/eng majors, and they are GREAT at getting you a job after you graduate. Nearly every RPI graduate goes onto grad school or has a job.</p>

<p>The social life at RPI is different from that of NEU in the sense that RPI's social life has a lot of organized activities on campus. The people at RPI are very involved and groups all over campus host events every night. NEU is in a city, so a lot of the kids there social life is city-dependent, where as RPIs is campus oriented.</p>

<p>As far as diversity goes, RPI is more diverse hands down. The people that go there are ethnically and socioeconomically, more diverse. And within each ethnicity are wide varieties of people. NEU has the typical preppy, white feel to it. (if thats what you like) It's also very Jewish, but sorta JAPy. RPI has a pretty high Jewish population too, but it isn't JAPy. [big factor for me b/c I'm jewish, but I don't like JAPs.]</p>

<p>I hope I could give a less biased, and another perspective, and please make sure that you hear both sides of the story before making decisions. Goodluck to all! :]</p>

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<p>I know it's late, but seeing as I'm from Boston, with my mother teaching part time at NEU, and I'm a CS major at RPI, I think I can have some input here :)</p>

<p>I don't mean to discourage you, but the main reason I picked RPI over NEU mostly because I wasn't very impressed with the CS program there. A friend of mine just graduated from NEU a year ago (he ended up going to MIT for grad school, which is awesome), so I managed to see what the coursework was like. It seemed to be a lot more technical than I would want from a CS degree: that is, a lot of "Programming in this language" or "such and such operating system" rather than theory (which I am heavily biased towards, being a math major as well). Personally, I viewed the Computer Science there as more of a hybrid between Computer Science and Software Engineering than theoretical Computer Science.</p>

<p>Also, the grading policy swayed me a bit towards RPI, as the average GPA at NEU is about one grade modifier higher than at RPI, making it more difficult to stand out. Of course, this also has downsides (in that companies see lower numbers).</p>

<p>On the other hand, Boston is significantly better than Troy. There's simply much more to do there. </p>

<p>As for diversity, I'd say NEU is probably slightly more diverse (though I can't say I've been there more than 6 or 7 times), but the difference isn't too significant. However, one demographic that seems to be very underrepresented at RPI (at least compared to the area of Greater Boston I grew up in) is the black population, which may or may not be just as missing at NEU.</p>