I think this is a very new program at UT dallas…do any of you have kids that are in this program? How is it?What are the advantages? People with kids that were in comp sci department in UT dallas…can you please post about job and graduate school opportunities that your kids got. Thank you!
My daughter was in it. Numerous CS classes are taught by the better faculty and at a higher level. They really want these kids to do research. It is a great program for kids looking to get a masters or more. My daughter is no longer in it because she could not keep the 3.5 required GPA for CS only classes. The classes were tough, little rounding, and the GPA requirement did not include required classes (like linear algebra) that did not have the CS prefix. She was probably taking too many hours and too many honors classes. So, I guess my advice is not too overload your schedule.
The positive that she got out of it was working with really smart kids. You will get good references for graduate school. She does have a well paying internship after her sophomore year - don’t know if CS2 helped but it surely didn’t hurt. It did hurt her overall GPA though.
@GTAustin …thank you so much for the information.Will keep what you said in mind.
Thanks @GTAustin! My S just tested for the program, and if he gets in I’ll speak with him about course management. He’ll have a lot of AP credit and I’ve already been advocating for him to take a lighter schedule at first…hopefully he will take this info under advisement. I’d be totally fine with him taking the minimum required hours for a full time student (12 I think?) so that he can devote plenty of time to each course. You mentioned your D might have overloaded her schedule, can you share a bit about her course load? Too many hours total, or too many difficult classes, or both?
She actually was taking 19 hours last semester with 3 honors classes. She is trying to do a second BS in cognitive science with a minor in fine art in 4 years. Four of her classes were technical - CS prob & stats, data structures, linear algebra and neurology with 3 of those being the honors courses. The other problem was that she was not taking any other CS courses besides honors. She thought courses that were in the major requirement, like linear algebra, would count towards the CS2 GPA requirement but that was not the case. Only courses with the CS prefix counts. She was disappointed with the outcome but she really likes cognitive science and wants to go more that direction anyway.
So, my suggestion is 15 hours and no more than 3 technical courses with the other 2 being GE, electives or the less technical CS classes. Probably, also a max of 2 honors classes and try to do those with non honors CS courses as well to help the GPA.
@GTAustin - Were the honors classes additional or were they honors versions of required classes on the degree plan?
Thanks.
They were the honors versions of required classes and if you are in CS2, you are required to take those classes. Not all CS classes have honors versions. My daughter did take honors Probability and Stats and honors data structures last semester. This semester she is taking C++ and software engineering, which neither has an honors version. If she could have mixed that up a bit with taking 1 honors and 1 non honors course, she would have had better results. The Honors classes are significantly harder than the non honors version or the courses with no honors offered.
That is such great information! Thanks for replying. We are looking at both options, but being OOS, keeping the GPA up is of primary importance. We really need to think about the honors program and see if the benefits are worth it in our case.
@GTAustin, when you say the honors classes are harder, do you mean just for CS or for all honors classes?
@traveler98, as a general rule, I think all honors classes are harder than the regular classes. In the CS classes, it is significant. My daughter would help non CS honors students with their classwork and found the material to be much easier. In her other honors courses, non CS, the material has been challenging and very interesting but she has been getting good scores in those. The honors program does limit the number of honors courses (non CS) per semester to 1 and you can possible add a second after everybody registers. With CS2, you have to take their CS honors courses and then you can take 1 more for a total of 3 per semester.
@chercheur, my daughter is also on scholarship, so GPA is important. Fortunately, the GPA for scholarships is 3.0 and has not been a problem at all in keeping. For CS2, it is 3.5 in a small subset of classes that you are taking, making it much harder to maintain. CS2 does give you access to the better students, teachers and smaller classes. This has kept her from being on the Dean’s list, but that is all. The other consideration for my daughter is that she is not 100% CS, she has varied interests. She took 2 years in HS but she is not one to be doing it 24/7 like some of the other kids. One other thing I would say is look at your child’s math background. The classes that were the hardest for my daughter were discrete math and CS probability and stats. My daughter had not had either of those and put her at a disadvantage. I don’t think anybody get discrete math at HS but the CS2 test is based on it. The lack of probability and stats did hurt her. If your child is a math whiz, they will do fine.
@GTAustin thank you so much for your detailed responses and help on all things UTD. I hope I’m not pestering you too much with all my questions on this and other threads, and I really appreciate all your insight.
A “thank you” from us as well. There is just no way to really understand a program from just visiting. If there is anything else we need to consider, please let us know. This is a situation where we don’t know what we don’t know!
Keep asking questions! Another observation about CS at UTD that is different than other programs is the number of required courses you have to take. I really never looked at it until recently. UT Austin only requires 6 CS courses and allows 8 elective CS courses totaling 44 hours with an additional 3 hours for stats. UTD requires 63 hours with only 9 hours being electives. Whether this is good or bad, I don’t know. I would think that UTD is requiring a broader CS knowledge base and with less specialization. It also may be a result of CS being in engineering vs CNS. UT Austin also appears to require more liberal arts courses - foreign language, writing outside of CS, global/cultural diversity classes. I would think this could be a good or bad thing just depending on your child - so just something to think about. Again, any other questions, just ask.
That’s very interesting! I need to re-examine the degree plans at the schools we’re looking at. Like you, I’m not sure which is better and where the balance should fall.
I also wonder if some of the requirements at UTD are for ABET. UT Austin is not accredited by ABET.
Yes, I believe ABET accreditation may account for some of the difference. I quickly glanced at the requirements at 2 other ABET schools, and they had around 17 required CS classes. UTD is slightly heavier on the CS requirements or it’s a matter of how the schools are labeling the classes.
Is your daughter happy at UTD? My student is struggling to pick one program over another, and I don’t really know how to help with that.
My daughter is very happy at UTD. She has her days, like yesterday, where she was struggling with a program where she would like to be a beach bum but overall it is a great school for her. She finds the academic environment to be supportive and collaborative vs competitive. The reasons she chose UTD were a scholarship, flexibility to take classes in many disciplines, large urban city with a music scene and small for a public university. The lack of high profile sports was not a concern. The reason she likes it even more now is the diversity, very involved with several clubs, lots of good friends and always something to do in DFW area. Having her own car there or access to a car, really helps with the experience. It was the right choice for her.
Thanks for sharing your daughter’s experience! I think all of the programs at the various schools are similar, but where will my student be happy? That’s the question. I’m so glad your daughter found a great fit, and we are strongly considering UTD.
@GTAustin …thank you for sharing your daughter’s experience.We are also still considering UTD. He is yet to take the CS2 exam…we are OOS and will not be able to travel to UTD to take it.He has requested info about taking it in his school.He is an NMF and this is such a tough decision with a free ride in one hand and a top 10 full pay in another.Thank you so much for the information you have provided.This is really really helpful
Could your students share a bit about the discrete math exam for CS2? My son took it and there were only 3 questions, two were “easy” or very do-able, and the third took quite a bit of computation , more than he felt he would have in the 1.5 hours to tea the whole exam, so he did not complete it. Or, he thought, that he may have needed to know a formula he didn’t know. Did your kids finish all 3 problems?