<p>Those numbers are close to my son’s school and they are about double the number from when he started. As they have grown, the main professor that teaches the intro course in the fall semester has taken on more students (he basically took on all of the incoming freshman and he has grad students too). They added another professor to teach the intro course when he hit about 105 students. The guy that teaches the intro course is a pretty big draw in the program but good luck on trying to catch him after class.</p>
<p>I can see limitations on class sizes based on efficiency and effectiveness and I can also see where programs require a minimum number of students. I imagine that there are students coming in from Community College transfer agreements and from private schools. There are industry scholarships and research at son’s school too - I guess that’s a way of indirect funding for a program - I don’t see why you limit numbers if there is industry demand either - unless there’s some kind of quota system at a higher level.</p>
<p>Amazon, Business is a graduate level program at Cornell. That’s why employers aren’t hiring undergrads with a BS in Business- because they don’t have them. They do however, have fantastic programs in Arts and Sciences, Engineering, and Labor Relations and I have hired new grads from all of those schools. I have never hired directly from the Hotel School (mainly because I’ve never worked in the hospitality industry) but I imagine a kid who is interested in Global Logistics and Supply Chain management would have better prospects majoring in Math out of the school of Arts and Sciences or Operations Research or an engineering discipline than he or she would with a degree in Hotel Administration.</p>
<p>Cornell graduate (and parent of a Cornell graduate) here.</p>
<p>Cornell does have an undergraduate business program, but it’s separate from the graduate level program and has a different name associated with it.</p>
<p>The head of the UW CS program said last week they limit enrollment because teaching CS properly means working with the students in small groups on projects–not the lecture method used in many classes. It as much an art as a science. Without lots more hard to find faculty the size is limited.</p>
<p>A friend’s kid with a BS Comp Sci from a decent Big 10 is headed to Seattle to work for Amazon. Salary from what his dad said was decent but not stellar given the cost of living. If Univ of Washington limits their production of grads, others will take the slack. </p>
<p>Likewise, I’ve been receiving recruiting emails from all the cool and trendy companies (including Amazon) thanks to my experience in graphics and media development, but they would literally have to double my salary to allow me to work there with the same standard of living. </p>
<p>But salaries are abysmal, and if we exclude some of the top companies and add in what people with experience make, even more abysmal. I can’t blame employers, they are the same idiots who paid $50/hr for Javascript kiddies in the late 90’s…</p>
<p>If they are hurting so badly, they should open up satellites in lower-cost locations. I’ve been working in a satellite for a major computer company since 1994 - low cost of living, San Francisco - style wages and access to a major metro.</p>
<p>“The head of the UW CS program said last week they limit enrollment because teaching CS properly means working with the students in small groups on projects–not the lecture method used in many classes. It as much an art as a science. Without lots more hard to find faculty the size is limited.”</p>
<p>See, that’s the kind of stuff I don’t believe for a minute when he claims it. I find it really, truly, unlikely that they couldn’t attract more faculty to a university like the UW, in a location like Seattle. My son’s school graduates almost double the amount of CS majors (with a hearty drop out rate in the major), though the school is 1/5th the size. It is also ridiculously hard to get accepted to the major, though that is because it rated at the top of the heap for CS. But at least the numbers of graduates to overall student body is more reasonable.</p>
<p>What’s the average class size at UW CS? As for finding faculty, I would not think it is a problem. It would be more of a problem to find funding and so on and grow the department. I’m not saying to make it 1000 students (like Cajun State did in the 80’s when Comp Sci became hot :)) but they list 50 faculty (visitors, full time, and research) and if they have total of 500 students that’s 10 to 1, great… But the important thing I’d like to see as a student is not 10 to 1 ratio, it would be awesome facilities and availability of lots of small, specialized courses and seminars for stuff courses and textbooks don’t even exist yet…</p>
<p>When I was at Purdue aeons ago we were ranked #2 or #3 (we’re still super ranked in Industrial Engineering) and believe you me, it was not teacher to student ratio (most of my classes had 20-30 students) or the facilities (affectionately known as Gruesome Hall) but faculty of unreal caliber and extremely fun research and course work. Also it was not impossible to get in - or get out of… I would wager even today, a 3.6-3.7 or so with decent SAT’s should get you in. </p>
<p>I had a chance to review some students’ work from there and was blown away with the quality of work (I had taken the class a couple decades earlier). Anyhow…</p>
<p>“Likewise, I’ve been receiving recruiting emails from all the cool and trendy companies (including Amazon) thanks to my experience in graphics and media development, but they would literally have to double my salary to allow me to work there with the same standard of living.”</p>
<p>Unless you are living in an incredibly cheap place in comparison, the cost of living is not that high here. Housing can be pricey if you’re looking for a mansion, or the ultimate location, but it has come down quite a bit, and there’s many reasonable areas. At low interest rates, the cost of housing is pretty good. No state income tax helps, but it is not that expensive to live here. I think of my massive air conditioning bills when I lived in the South, and all the vacations I had to take just to escape from the heat, and the slight cost differential is worth it.</p>
<p>Yes I was also surprised the job hunt was so unproductive for D friends. She said the group as a whole did interviewing in the fall–>winter, seemed things would be better than it has turned out, seems to have come to a dead stop after about Feb/March. </p>
<p>Put it this way out of the 20 kids only one truly obscure major. Not one going to grad school, she said they wont do the further education route, not worth debt with no guarantee 2 years from now except more debt.</p>
<p>Many PhDs in CS are snapped up by private companies as are some experienced top faculty. Finding those that can teach it and speak good English is very tough. And yes, there is that funding issue and how big do you really want to get? 50 is a large dept by most measures.</p>
<p>I just had a look at a BLS unemployment chart from 2010 to 2012. Unemployment peaked in Nov 2010 (there was a reason for this but I don’t recall it at the moment) and then headed down until late February, rise through August before heading back down again. Things seem similar this year with the slowdown in the springtime. I recall that last summer was pretty dead for hiring.</p>
<p>“how big do you really want to get? 50 is a large dept by most measures.”</p>
<p>That does sound like a large dept. Especially for one that is graduating such a puny number of students. Kind of makes you wonder if these professors are teaching one class per semester and doing research the rest of the time.</p>
<p>Sounds like you have the best of all worlds, BCEagle. Live free or die!</p>
<p>The cost of living for us includes things like income taxes, property taxes, K-12 education quality since we still have one in a top public HS, securing employment for Mrs. Turbo, utilities, and of course housing costs for our current Walmart sized house. </p>
<p>As much as I like the West Coast, and the Pacific Northwest (I spent a month in Portland a decade ago) it simply is not comparable financially to my specific current situation. Likewise, I lived in Boston for a while and could make the exact same comment for there as well. If I was younger, single, and had no kids to worry about, awesome, but I’m not going to pay Cupertino prices for rent or the like to send my kids to a decent HS. </p>
<p>The corollary is also true. Because of our location we don’t always get top talent because it goes in the ‘hot’ places to live, never mind that what we do is par with what they do (very cutting edge stuff). A lot of these ‘hot’ opportunities in reality are sheep-herding offshore resources…</p>
<p>From what I have observed dumb accounting majors tend to fair better than “superlative” history majors. I work at a national firm right now and many of my cooworkers were really average students. They got around a 1500-1800 on the new SAT, attended a Cal State University, and obtained a 3.3-3.5 gpa overall. We work in a high rise and love going down to the restaurant across the street. At this restaurant we are waited on by about 6 or 7 stanford and berkely grads. They have various worthless majors like history, english and literature. </p>
<p>I have a handful of friends the graduated form various “prestigious” institutions with these degrees and I don’t know any that got a decent job.</p>
<p>“I work at a national firm right now and many of my cooworkers were really average students”</p>
<p>Interesting. I worked in Chicago at a Big Four firm, and 90% of the people at our firm graduated from Illinois or Notre Dame. Also, most of these people had above a 3.6 GPA in undergrad and passed the CPA exam on their first attempt.</p>
<p>The problem with “market chasing” in choosing a major can be that by the time the student graduates and gets on the market, things may very well have changed. For example, pharmacy was an unbelievably good market about 5-9 years ago. Now, when students who entered accelerated pharmacy programs or applied to non-accelerated programs when the market was widely considered glorious are facing significant saturation and difficulty finding employment (especially f/t employment with benefits), often with $150-200k in debt from pharmacy school.</p>
<p>If everyone majors in accounting now, the market in 4, 5, 6 years likely won’t favor accountants so much.</p>
<p>That doesn’t mean that some majors aren’t more marketable than others, but choosing a major with the idea that market trends will stay “as is” for a number of years may backfire.</p>