<p>Hi all,
I recently admitted to UC Berkeley as Computer Science (L&S). I understand that I am admitted to college of letters and sciences doesn't mean I am admitted to the CS major. I have to obtain a 3.0 GPA in order to declare my CS major. In community college, I have taken all 3 levels of physics, calculus series and linear & differential and a circuit class. My concern is that the BA degree under computer science (L&S). I am wondering if a BA degree will affect much on my future, or it's the same? If so, should I change my CS major to EECS? Is it impossible to do? I don't understand why CS major could be BA, but it involves with a lot of sciences and math. By the way, I have completed all my GE. Any feedback will be helpful. Thank you!</p>
<p>It’s a CS degree from Berkeley, employers know that both programs are amazing and share many of the same classes.</p>
<p>The career center has some good information on this: <a href=“https://career.berkeley.edu/Major2012/Major.stm”>https://career.berkeley.edu/Major2012/Major.stm</a>
Specially, here’s [url="<a href=“https://career.berkeley.edu/Major2012/EECS.stm"]EECS[/url">https://career.berkeley.edu/Major2012/EECS.stm"]EECS[/url</a>] and [url=”<a href="https://career.berkeley.edu/Major2012/CompSci.stm"]CS[/url">https://career.berkeley.edu/Major2012/CompSci.stm"]CS[/url</a>]. The tech giants hire from both majors, as do smaller companies and start-ups. Your coursework, grades, and knowledge will matter a lot more than whether your degree says BS or BA.</p>
<p>It <em>does</em> make a difference if you want to do EE or if ABET accreditation is important to you, but ABET should only matter in really specific areas like patent law. Otherwise the majors share many of the same classes, and you’ll have the exact same options for CS courses.</p>
<p>The administrative side of things is different as well. EECS is more STEM oriented, and you’ll take more maths and physics, for GE you’ll do CoE’s H/SS requirement. L&S is a bit more humanities-ish, and you’ll be subjected to their breadth requirements. And I’m sure you’ve noticed already that EECS admits directly to the major while L&S requires the completion of lower div pre-reqs before you can declare.</p>
<p>I’m still not quite sure where you stand, you didn’t mention freshman/transfer. If you’re a freshman, changing to EECS is hard but not impossible. If you’re a transfer, changing to CoE isn’t allowed. More info here: <a href=“Change of college - Berkeley Engineering”>http://coe.berkeley.edu/students/current-undergraduates/change-of-college</a></p>
<p>“My concern is that the BA degree under computer science (L&S). I am wondering if a BA degree will affect much on my future, or it’s the same?” No. “should I change my CS major to EECS?” Absolutely not!
Berkeley EECS means pride and prejudice.</p>
<p>Thanks failure 622. I am a transfer student btw. I am just worrying about future employers will judge my BA degree in CS. It’s weird how Berkeley is one of the few schools with BA degree in CS. I mean, CS involves with a lot of math and sciences too!</p>
<p>You can get a Bachelor of Arts in CS at UCSC, UCSD, and Princeton as well.</p>
<p>I hate to break it to you, but as a transfer student you are not allowed to change to the college of engineering. <a href=“Change of college - Berkeley Engineering”>http://coe.berkeley.edu/students/current-undergraduates/change-of-college</a></p>
<p>I’m experiencing some heartache over this myself, but maybe for you it’s a good thing since it makes things simpler. For what it’s worth, I would trade places with you if I could.</p>
<p>Edit: Oops, I just noticed @failure622 had already pointed that out.</p>
<p>The difference between a BA and BS in CS is literally just one letter. You might have a few less mandatory math classes than EECS majors but I highly doubt that any employer cares in the software industry. Everyone knows what any CS degree from Cal is worth anyways. And just because you’re not REQUIRED to take as many math courses as EECS majors, does not mean that you CAN’T. If you want to, by all means go ahead and take them.</p>
<p>Also to put things into perspective, many jobs in the software industry don’t even require you to have a BS OR BA in CS. You could major in something like Math, Cog Sci etc and still have an almost similar number of opportunities to work as a developer/programmer as long as you have the necessary skills. </p>
<p>@AngelJ I thought it’s easy to transfer from EECS to L&S.
@Truust I agree with you that BA and BS is just one letter difference. But I heard having a BA degree gives a disadvantage on certain scholarship/internship because they are looking for CS in BS degree.
I am planning to do a minor in math as well. Hopefully it will be useful in the future. </p>
<p>It will be easier to do a second major or minor in math with L&S CS. However, it may not be any more useful than just taking specific math courses of interest or relevance to your goals (unless your goal is PhD study in math).</p>
<p>Regarding scholarships, yes, it could matter if there is a scholarship specifically for engineering majors. But there may also be scholarships specifically for L&S students. Generally, it is not really worth the trouble to change from L&S CS to EECS if you want to study CS (as opposed to EE). If you want to qualify for the patent exam from the non-ABET-accredited L&S CS major, you can choose course work as listed in the patent exam general requirements bulletin to qualify.</p>
<p>
Sorry @vanille08, I’m confused. Your first post implied that you wanted to change from L&S to EECS, which is not possible for transfer students.</p>
<p>@AngelJ Sorry to confuse you. I was talking about your case. I thought you are in EECS trying to transfer to L&S.
After looking more into it, it seems impossible to switch from L&S to EECS. I also notice it’s impossible to switch major between College of Engineering.
Thanks for the info @ucbalumnus</p>
<p>@vanille08, oooh, the confusion was my fault! I see what you mean now. I’ll have to look into that! Thanks!</p>
<p>The employment opportunity for Berkeley BA Comp Sci and BS EECS is no different.</p>
<p>The problem with BA Comp Sci is specific to freshmen. As a freshmen you are coming in undeclared and are not guaranteed Comp Sci major. You have get 3.0 GPA or higher is 7 subjects in first two years and then apply to the Comp Sci major. And they may still deny you depending on demand.</p>
<p>So I heard that many students (freshmen) admitted to berkeley BA Comp sci program decline admission in favor of another good college that guarantees them the CS major, like UIUC, UT Austin etc.</p>
<p>@collegeCS It’s not a freshman only problem, new transfers in L&S are also admitted undeclared, and held to the same standards for declaring the CS major. So it’s the same dilemma CS/EECS freshmen face, except transfers usually know what they’re doing and succeed in their CS classes. :P</p>
<p>@failure622 Just to clarify, you said: “dilemma CS/EECS freshmen face”. I thought EECS freshmen do not face this dilemma since they are guaranteed EECS as long as they maintain a 2.0 GPA. Thanks.</p>
<p>
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<p>If you meet the 3.0 GPA requirement, then you are GUARANTEED to get into the major.</p>
<p>@collegeCS, yeah EECS applicants are guaranteed the major if they get in.</p>
<p>@Truust Really the students with >=3.0 GPA in L&S are guaranteed to CS? This is very important for my son. </p>
@drawinrain A 3.0 in UCB CS61A,61B,61C AT BERKELEY not CCC GPA.
It will be 3.3 going forward.
“L&S students may petition to enter the L&S CS major once they have completed the seven technical prerequisites (below) with a GPA of 3.0 or higher. We expect this GPA to be increased to 3.3 for students entering Berkeley in fall 2015.”
@StevenToCollege
Thanks, didn’t realize how old this thread was, I thought this was the UCB 2015 thread. Thanks for the heads up, that definitely changes things.