Whats The Difference Between A CompSci Degree In A Liberal Arts College Vs Tech University?

@merc81

I disagree - I think RUs typically have greater depth AND breadth when it comes to CS course offerings and curriculum (what @Rivet2000 is saying).

No one seems to be claiming that. The comments on Smith seem to be a side topic about whether it has an “open curriculum” with no general education requirements. Whether Smith has a good CS department is another question entirely.

No. Was anything claiming that?

True, though sometimes the general education requirements overlap with major requirements or prerequisites, such as in math or non-CS science courses. MIT is an example.

@ucbalumnus , my question about extensive general education requirements was in response to your post about Smith. My question about the “all-in” commitment was in response to @Rivet2000’s post #34.
I’m trying to understand what’s being asserted here, not put words in anyone’s mouth (specifically about general education breadth requirements, or about open curriculum programs, w.r.t. the LAC/CS discussion).

I think most of us can agree that if you want the greatest number of available CS courses, you’re unlikely to get that at a LAC (unless you count what’s available from consortium partners). If the ACM report I cited above is correct, a “typical” CS major at a LAC might take as many as 12 courses and a typical CS major at a university might take as few as 12. A key issue in this thread seems to be whether a LAC can satisfy the needs of a student who wants more like the upper end of what a “typical” university CS major might take (12-15 courses per the ACM – but not way more than that), including more than one or two courses in a specialized area (without getting into the equivalent of a Master’s degree).

@tk21769

It seems many top LACs right now are requiring 8-9 CS courses instead of 12. 8-9 courses vs. 12-15 courses is a pretty substantial discrepancy (especially when some LACs seem are covering topics in 2-3 courses what RUs do in 1-2 courses) AND are covering those topics at a lighter level. For example, you cannot possibly be learning Data Structures and Algorithms to a deep level without considering Complexity and Optimization, which requires some knowledge of Discrete Mathematics/Structures and potentially Calculus on top of that (the former of which the LACs largely seem to not require and the latter of which seems to not be required quite often as well). Questions with Complexity and Optimization are VERY common in coding interviews, so that means that LAC students need to put more effort in practicing/learning these topics on their own.

The only thing I was asserting was that Smith is not an “open curriculum” school in response to the question in reply #33. I made or implied no assertion about whether or not Smith is a good place for a CS major.

A LAC in my area serves ~1400 undergrads and is not very selective or highly ranked. I’m familiar enough with its CS curriculum to know that its required courses do cover Complexity early in the program (or at least they did a few years ago). The CS major there requires 12 specific courses (totaling 38 credits), an additional 9 credits of 300-level or above computer science elective courses, plus math courses (calculus, statistics, discrete math).

I can’t speak for all ~200 LACs in the USA, but if this local college is any indication, it must be the case that many of them require (or encourage) more than just 8-9 courses. I trust that the Association for Computing Machinery speaks with some authority when they indicate a typical LAC load is 9-12 courses (although granted, my source for that is a report written in 2001). If some of the top LACs now only require 8-9 CS courses, I’m not sure what to conclude from that. As stated upthread, “each college’s CS department should be investigated individually”.

Totally agree with @yikesyikesyikes 
for example,

GTech offers the following threads for their BS Comp Science along with recommended courses:

http://www.cc.gatech.edu/threads-better-way-learn-cs

a) Devices
b) Info Internetworks
c) Intelligence
d) Media
e) Modeling and Simulation
f) People
g) Systems & Architecture
h) Theory

This is the type of breadth (or depth) that smaller/less specialized univs (LACs) just can’t offer.

A tech U will offer not only the “normal” CS courses for the major but often specialties within CS, lots of different courses, initially in large lectures taught by profs with lab/discussion sections with TAs.

A LAC will offer the normal courses in CS but usually will expect/offer exploration of other subjects and possibly a double major. Classes are likely to be taught by full professors and be small from intro courses all the way through.

That’s more or less how I’d answer that question, with the caveat that there is a LOT of variation within those categories. I’d think it possible for one student to find a good fit at Harvey Mudd (esp if female) or CMU, but not at Smith or WPI, or vice-versa.

I thought it was well established that LACs tend to offer broader educations and not as much depth as universities.

I would think a Michigan student and an Amherst student are both going to get great educations but they are going to be a bit different. If you are strictly focused on one technical subject like CS, Michigan probably has the advantage. If you are focussed on overall breadth, Amherst probably has the advantage.

I am confused about why this is controversial. What am I missing?

We can consider a few hypothetical cases:

  1. Student at an LAC who takes the minimum number of CS courses (~11) needed for a major.
  2. Student at a well-resourced university who takes a greater amount of CS courses (12-15) essentially by requirement. Because of notably wide curricular choice, this student may have the option of specializing to a degree.
  3. Student at a well-resourced LAC who *elects* to take 15 CS courses. This student may pursue special topics of interest through seminar or thesis courses.
  4. Student at a moderately resourced university who takes 12 CS courses by requirement, but who has less key courses from which to choose than than might be available at a well-resourced LAC.
  5. Student at an LAC who takes the minimum amount of CS courses for the major, but who also pursues a math major (~20 CS/math courses total).

Which student has received the best CS education? The answer may depend upon both context and opinion.

Chances are, someone seriously considering a school like Georgia Tech isn’t also seriously considering LACs. Or vice-versa.

For many good, upper-middle income students considering a CS major, the school to beat (for quality/price) is your own state flagship. Not Swarthmore, but also not Georgia Tech (unless you’re from Georgia.)

In addition to 1-5 above you’ll need to add more, like goals (basic CS vs a vertical like NLP), student academic qualifications, and an RU and LAC program to compare. That might make it easier.

That colleges (within the general classes of LACs and universities) can vary considerably, and that students at colleges can vary considerably.

In your example, it is certainly possible for an Amherst student to avoid any semblence of breadth because Amherst’s open curriculum requires none. In addition, the student can go into considerable depth in his/her major (CS or otherwise) by taking cross-registered courses at UMass or other colleges in the consortium. Whether any Amherst students actually do this is another matter entirely, but it is at least theoretically possible for an Amherst student to study a narrower and deeper curriculum than a Michigan student who is subject to general education requirements.

Well the consortium sounds good but it basically means a college can’t stand on its own for a particular discipline. That would be like comparing Berkeley to all six Claremont colleges because you can cross register.

LACs are excellent and imo underrated but bringing up that you need other colleges to go in-depth is not an advantage. Also the OP was on LAC vs tech university, not necessarily state flagship. So the apt comparison is more Amherst to MIT, in which case it’s not just the classes but access to the cutting edge of CS. Comparing MIT to a LAC in CS is a little unfair, maybe something like Wesleyan to RPI?

@tk21769 wrote:

I think that’s exactly right. Someone who arrives on campus, see-sawing between a major in Math or a major in CS or maybe a double major in CS and something else (Econ, Bio,or even - Music!) will take a very different road, depending on where they matriculate. At Georgia Tech, they would have to begin steering themselves towards satisfying the CS prerequisites almost immediately while at a place like Wesleyan, there would be no prerequisites and, conceivably, someone could spend until the end of sophomore year, picking up ideas on what to major in. What they lose in terms of time to specialize at Wesleyan, they can make up in part, by tutorials and senior theses.

@theloniusmonk wrote:

Sometimes, the very nature of the cross-training one receives at a LAC determines the specialty. For example, at Wesleyan someone can receive a Certificate in Bioinformatics which is a subject most people would not pursue until in graduate school: http://www.wesleyan.edu/imcp/

CS Faculty at Amherst (total of 6, incl 2 on leave); Math & Stats Faculty (18 incl Stats)

https://www.amherst.edu/academiclife/faculty_profiles

EECS Faculty at UMich

http://www.eecs.umich.edu/eecs/faculty/csefaculty.html

DBs and Data Mining Faculty at UMich (8)

http://www.eecs.umich.edu/eecs/etc/fac/CSEfaculty.html?resno=56

I count 108 Michigan CS faculty listed on the page @i012575 cited.
That’s a big resource advantage for Michigan, even (to some extent) if they don’t all teach undergrads. Keep in mind that UMichigan is a much larger school. It apparently granted about 16X as many Bachelor degrees as Amherst in 2015 (Mich 6933 v. Amherst 432 per IPEDS). A higher percentage of Michigan degrees were in CS (7.4% v. 5.1% for Amherst, per recent CDS files). So, apparently Michigan graduated ~500 CS majors and Amherst only ~20 CS majors Somebody double-check my numbers? There may be some slop in them depending on which year’s data you use, exactly how you count faculty, etc.

After rounding off, the overall CS Student:Faculty ratio (based on graduating CS majors not all CS students) seems to be about 5:1 for Michigan vs. 4:1 for Amherst. Or maybe it’s more like 5:1 for Amherst, too (after discounting for professors on leave.) The real world ratio may be much higher than 5:1 at Michigan (after discounting for professors who aren’t available much for undergrads). Hard to say. But then 
 we haven’t even factored in the presence of grad students (which one could count entirely as a big decrement to Michigan’s S:F ratio, although they also are a resource for undergraduate teaching).

Regardless, I think one must acknowledge Michigan has a big advantage in available faculty resources (even if in the real world, Michigan classes turn out to be significantly larger). That assumes we aren’t counting the large number of consortium faculty/classes available to Amherst students (resources that most other LACs would not have).

Now compare net prices.

VA resident, family income $50K, 1 child, $25K savings, $25K home equity
$7,680 Amherst
$11,774 Michigan

VA resident, family income $100K, 1 child, $50K savings, $50K home equity
$23,350 Amherst
$44,209 Michigan

VA resident, family income $150K, 1 child, $75K savings, $75K home equity
$39,400 Amherst
$60,271 Michigan

Of course, if we assume an in-state tuition advantage, or no aid (full sticker prices for both), the picture changes.

^^ if the standard were to become number of faculty in a department, then universities would be similarly advantageous in nearly all fields (English literature, etc.), and the the discussion of CS here could serve as a case example indicating that universities provide better educational environments than LACs for most fields. Since this seems clearly untenable, the special factors that make CS studies distinct in this way from other majors would need to be identified in order to make this approach (particularly as it relates to the theme of the thread in general) a viable form of analysis.

^^Yeah, I don’t see how this argument differs from any other one involving high-quality LACs versus research universities. Sitting in the back of a lecture hall, face buried in a laptop, taking notes, is qualitatively different than being able to raise your hand and ask questions of a professor, whether it’s CS or English Lit. You want to delve deeply into a subject? Ask questions in class. That’s how you do it.