Folks, I have poured thru the threads trying to compile a list of the top 20 comp sci schools outside the typical MIT, Caltech, Harvard, etc. Can anyone point me to a list on this or another part of CC? or maybe list out the top 20. Geographical location is not imp, nor is fin aid at this point.
Thanks for your hek.
Every top CS list typically starts with Stanford and MIT (neither of which are Ivies).
ivies aren’t even good in CS lol. In US news, there are really only 2-3 ivies that is even top 19 CS schools (Cornell, Princeton, and maybe Columbia?).
CMU has a very good CS program without the rep of Stanford and MIT. Then there is UIUC, Georgia Tech, UT Austin.
Thanks for your replies. What does UIUC stand for? Which others would you recommend other than CMU, Stanford and MIT which are all very difficult to get in to? I am looking for the ones that people tend to overlook because everyone is taken up by the MIT’s and CMU’s.
Lots of schools have perfectly good CS majors. An example of a frequently overlooked one is Rutgers.
http://www.computersciencedegreehub.com/50-innovative-computer-science-departments/
http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/rankings/engineering-doctorate-computer
Thanks for all your replies. Has anyone come across a thread dedicated to computer science at different schools with students providing their experiences?
In order
- MIT and Stanford (tie)
- Carnegie Mellon, University of Washington (the cs program specifically), Berkeley
- UIUC, UMich, Georgia Tech, UT Austin
This is for UNDERGRAD based on likeliness to get a job and overall quality of the CS department
Normal rankings are for research or reputation (cs research doesn’t really matter much for undergrad, compared to almost any other major)
It’s now 2016. There is no question that CS majors will get jobs. That is no longer the criteria like it was during the Great Recession. The CS economy is doing extremely well. Companies are paying a lot and are fighting for recruits.
The question is where you will develop the most capabilities among the stiffest competition. CS research is very valuable for this.
I agree with Furoni’s list - those are standard rankings- but I would never pay OOS tuition for a California state school.
Some other schools to consider in no particular order
Harvey Mudd
Cornell
Johns Hopkins
USC
Waterloo (Ontario)
Washington University St Louis
Rice
UChicago
Purdue
Wisconsin
But be aware that, except at the wealthiest of the private schools, CS can be a difficult to get into major at schools where it has a strong reputation. In cases where one applies to the major when applying to the school, the CS major may be substantially more selective than the school overall, and some applicants get rejected, or get admitted as undeclared or some other major. At these schools, it may be difficult to change into the CS major after enrolling.
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/19262574/#Comment_19262574
Not being an Ivy does not mean “easy to get into”, either. A lot of these schools are tough admissions. @Furoni, where did you get that list? Hard to believe Mudd is not on it, unless it is using overall numbers vs percentages.
How would Utah compare to the schools listed above in the previous other posts?
Edit: I meant University of Utah
@Jerseyshor , here is a post about a student’s experiences at Washington. https://www.quora.com/What-is-it-like-to-be-a-computer-science-major-at-the-University-of-Washington
Undergraduate CS rankings are useless. Unless there’s a particular specialty track at a school, there isn’t much to distinguish most CS programs, and the quality of education at #10 isn’t likely to be any better than it is at #50. In fact, a lot of people will probably do better at #50 or #100.
CS is one of those things you learn on your own while hacking away in front of your computer. I’ve heard and seen lots of CS lectures at different schools, and they’re all pretty much the same.
^^^ Sorry but just so wrong.
Lectures are all the same, but amount and degree of difficulty of problems and exams increase as expectations increase.
Some schools are application heavy and will prepare you for your first job. Some schools have so much theory that you will be prepared to deal with paradigms that don’t even exist yet. Some schools have robust research programs in the hottest areas.
If all you want to do is program, sure learn it on your own, go to directional state university, rock and roll all night and party every day. If you want a 40+ year career spent on the cutting edge, better set your sights a bit higher.
That said, there are a lot of great schools in CS. Look at the curriculum.
The places I’ve worked, the programmers from top universities and directional state universities all do the same tasks and sit in the same style of office or cubicle, or sit right next to each other on an open floor.
The point being that going to a top-ranked university doesn’t mean you’re going to do better than someone from a directional state university in the job market. Last place I worked the department was run by a guy from San Jose State, and we had people from Stanford, Harvard, Cal, USC, UCLA, various CSUs, and foreign universities you’ve never heard of sitting side by side doing the programming grunt work.
@ijustwannasleep I believe Utah has one of the best Computer Graphics programs in the country.
Absolutely correct. If this is your modest goal - to do programming grunt work, then it doesn’t matter.
But if you have higher aspirations, and the ability to EXCEL at good schools in a field of top students, they can provide opportunities that would not be available at directional state university.
Maybe up to 10-15 years ago people would have had an advantage if they went to a tippy-top CS school because there were VCs and angel investors hanging around looking for students with start-up ideas. These days it’s so easy to bootstrap a new idea into a business that going to a school like that is no longer necessary, If you go to a directional state university you may have to work a little harder to search out opportunities, but there will be no opportunities available to a student at a top-ranked school that aren’t also available to students who graduate from less prestigious schools.
The only advantage I can think of with going to a school like Stanford or MIT is there will be an entrepreneurial virus in the air that infects students, so many graduates will be motivated to start businesses rather than simply get a good job working for someone else.
I’ve taken CS classes at multiple universities, including Stanford. The only difference is that none of the students at Stanford slept through class like they might have at other schools.
Regardless of the school’s prestige or what you think of it, a prospective CS major should check these things:
A. If the CS department is large enough to offer a reasonable selection of junior/senior level CS courses. Some schools (both high and low prestige) have limited CS offerings, so they may not be as suitable for a prospective CS major as some other schools.
B. If the CS major offers direct admission to entering frosh or transfer students; if not (or you are offered admission to the school but not the major), if the CS major requires a high GPA or competitive secondary admission process to enter. Attending a school with the best CS department may not help if you cannot get into the CS major, and cannot take CS courses as a non-major because all of their space is filled with students in the CS major.