<p>UIUC's computer science department tends to be ranked higher than Princeton's and Caltech's, but is this really accurate? Since I'd imagine the quality of students at Caltech and Princeton would be higher than at UIUC (even using some kind of metric that deals with the fact UIUC has many more, probably less academically competitive on average students), I'm kind of skeptical. Thoughts?</p>
<p>Why so much focus on the other students? You are working with and for the faculty and trying to impress them and learn from them. If you are good enough to actually stand out some faculty will take you as a protege and let you take advanced grad level classes. Grads of Princeton and Cal Tech go to Illinois for grad school. There are plenty of very bright students at a place like Illinois so nobody can coast through it. It might actually be tougher because they expect some to fail and don’t really care.</p>
<p>I think one of the most common misconceptions among students is judging an institution by the quality of its students. Ex: Purdue. In the field of engineering it is considered elite, as UIUC is in computer science or engineering. However, despite Purdue’s elite status, it has an acceptance rate of somewhere around 70%. Yet, this has not compromised the academic rigor of the university. I suspect the school’s 40% drop-out rate shows this.</p>
<p>I’m not concerned so much about selectivity or “prestige” (although they do somewhat concern me), as I am with the actual intelligence of the students. I understand that professors teach, but I think that the kind of students I’m around has a big impact on my attitude, passion, and my own drive to learn. I’d also imagine that better professors would be drawn to places with better students, and better resources in general.</p>
<p>Many schools with high acceptance rates have rigorous weed-out courses to ensure the quality of particular programs, and, as you so inelegantly put it “the actual intelligence” of its students.</p>
<p>“as you so inelegantly put it “the actual intelligence” of its students”</p>
<p>I was distinguishing intelligence from things like selectivity, “prestige”, or being “elite”; what exactly is inelegant about that?</p>
<p>This is less true of Caltech, but getting into Princeton is as much about writing/singing/basketball/French/community service etc. as about “actual intelligence.” My guess is that the CS majors at UIUC and Princeton are roughly equal when it comes to CS…the Princeton folks are going to be better at other things. UIUC doesn’t care if you’re a Renaissance man or not.</p>
<p>“I was distinguishing intelligence from things like selectivity, “prestige”, or being “elite”; what exactly is inelegant about that?”</p>
<p>– because students’ alleged intelligence doesn’t necessarily correlate to their performance in school or to the quality of the school itself.</p>
<p>Completely my opinion, but I would pick the school with the smartest students. No program can be better than its students. How could it be?
Often the rankings in a specific subject correlate with the size of the program.<br>
I’m a resident of Illinois and I happen to think only a fool would pick it over Caltech or Princeton except under extreme financial duress. In this case, if your parents are very high income, maybe that’s a factor in U of I’s favor. But override that anyway if you can manage it.</p>
<p>
UIUC ranks higher in computer engineering because it has better facilities and more established faculty who are recognized leaders in their fields. These are the main factors measured by peer assessment.</p>
<p>Anyone that thinks UI CS students are not very smart is not very smart. They might not be as well rounded on average but here will be plenty smarter/better than you in CS. And how can any program only be as good as the average student. If you are outstanding at UI you would be outstanding anywhere. I seriously doubt there are many straight A CS students and you can always do grad classes or independent work with a prof you like and vice versa. And no, the CS rankings don’t have much to do with the size of the program although you have to a certain size to have depth. They look at outstanding faculty who are leaders in the field. Illinois has had quite a few and their facilities are better than just about anywhere with the super-computer labs and such. .</p>
<p>As I recall, barrons is a proud Wisconsin grad.
I’m not putting down the Big Ten, public college graduates, or CS folks. I am a public college graduate myself and am frankly intimidated by CS people, period.
But I question why someone would urge a teenager, whose lifetime occupation and even major is subject to change, to attend
Illinois to someone who was admitted to CalTech or Princeton. If either of them turned out not to meet the student’s needs, no problem transferring to Illinois.</p>
<p>@danas. …because Illinois has word-class facilities for CS that are hard to match (Siebel Center, Blue Waters, Beckman Institute, Granger, Micro/Nano Lab) as well as one of the largest ACM chapters in the world.</p>
<p>And ranking algorithms use many more factors than facilities and size.</p>