<p>I was planning to apply for the MSCS program at Stanford. Honestly though, it would mainly be for the prestige. Of course I am also interested in learning advanced material but I can easily do that myself by reading books or watching appropriate lectures online. No need to spend tens of thousands of dollars on the material.</p>
<p>I mainly want to go because I am really intro entrepreneurship and Stanford is known for that. I would imagine that the Stanford name gives you a nice boost and grabs VC attention in Silicon Valley. Also, making connections with other Stanford students and alumni will most likely turn out to be useful in the future.</p>
<p>What do you think? Are the points above actually true or are they just my imagination? Are they worth to spend that much time and money on?</p>
<p>I have to admit that there is something to say about being a Stanford alumn. Now that I am a graduate student at Stanford (math, not computer science), I am being recruited by companies (technology, finance, consulting) who would have not even read my job application with my undergraduate degree from a not top-20 university. </p>
<p>Is it worth it? I guess that depends on the other options you currently have. I can see the Stanford name helping you out employment-wise, but I am not entirely sure how big of a help it would be for a prospective entrepreneur. Stanford does support its students in their entrepreneurial endeavors for sure (free legal advice and workshops, for example). But everyone here seems very secretive about their plans. There’s a collective paranoia on campus that someone might steal your business idea and take off with it before you’ve had a chance to get going.</p>
<p>Thanks for the answers and happy new year to you guys :)</p>
<p>
Do you mind to elaborate on your opinion?</p>
<p>b@r!um: My undergraduate degree is from a UC Berkeley, which actually is a top-5 school for Computer Science, but it’s not as prestigious as Stanford on the undergraduate level (graduate level is a different story of course). I don’t think I’ll have problems getting companies to read my application but I really am not interested in working for any large company out there. I am currently working on my own startup and if that doesn’t work out, well, then I’ll continue with another one. I’m pretty involved in the startup community and I feel that whenever a startup has the “Stanford” label attached to it it automatically gets some sort of publicity boost or more attention form VCs. It could just be my imagination though because I’ve always wanted to go to Stanford :)</p>
<p>On the other hand I’ve also read a bunch of bad stuff about the Stanford MSCS program. It doesn’t offer any financial aid and it’s supposed to be relatively easy to get into if you can pay for it, thus other schools are actually preferred. Still, these statements come from some random people and I’m just not sure how true all of this is. I don’t doubt that it’s easier to get into than, let’s say, the Berkeley MSCS program (which is focused on research) but is it really looked down upon?</p>
<p>what’s to explain?
If you want a job, get a job.
Compare the COA to lost wages/experience/savings/…
Compare this result to the amount of time to recover the differential.</p>
<p>I have thoughts that you an HS or early college student. Someone from the Bay area and a grad from UCB would know these answers.</p>
<p>We are parents of a CMU grad. We figured it out after 4 minutes</p>
Isn’t that exactly what you were hoping to get out of the endeavor anyway? You made it pretty clear that you don’t care about the education but rather the Stanford name being attached to your start-up. </p>
<p>I honestly cannot give you advice. You probably know the start-up scene much better than I do and you are in a better position to judge if the investment would pay off.</p>
<p>What do your friends in the startup community think?</p>
More or less, yes. I also care a lot about the connections I can make there. And there’s the personal reason that I’ve always felt attracted to Stanford and that it has been one of my dreams to go there. But you are right, I don’t care too much about the education since I’m not planning on getting into research and I can self-study whatever I need to. However, even if that’s what I’m trying to get out of it that doesn’t change the question if it’s worth it. If, after all, VCs in Silicon Valley look at it as a “pay and you get in deal” then it won’t fulfill my purpose. A similar argument can be made for making connections. If it really is such a program then the student body will probably be of “lower quality” relative to other programs and the possibility of making great connection will suffer a bit as well (though not as much since I of course have access to the whole student/professor body).</p>
<p>My friends in the startup community think that it’s a great program and haven’t heard of the “pay and you get in” rumor. Still, they are not really in the know about these kind of things, they are not VCs or extremely successful or anything like that : )</p>
<p>One of DS undergrad CMU '06 roommates (bme) left his job and did a “software idea” in San Jose… Recently sold it this year and bought a condo.</p>
<p>DS roommate (UCB BSCS) master’s at Toronto '08, involved in a startup. Sold this year to Google, where he now works.</p>
<p>DS (BSMeche, MSCS) formed a corporation, '09, with his mentor at Udub. He quit the venture after 6 months.</p>
<p>DS’s current manager, with a CC degree and self taught, sold his company, and now a manager of platform applications, '11. Seattle.</p>
<p>You don’t need to go to Stanford. You need to be looking for ideas and friends that you can trust and they can trust. If Stanford is it, who can say but you.</p>