Who here is a Computer Science major?

<p>I'm interested in transferring from a California community college to Berkeley to major in Computer Science. However, I don't want to end up with a really low GPA. Anyone here majoring in Computer Science and could they tell me what it's like? What can I do during my community college years to make myself competitive when I arrive at Berkeley so that I may manage with a high GPA?</p>

<p>Start going over the webcasts and past exams.</p>

<p>Curious, since computer science is impacted, what are the popular majors that intended students fall back into if they cannot get in?</p>

<p>Well the most general advice I can give is learn to learn quickly. I don't know if that's possible, but being able to pick up things fast is what leads to success in classes IMO. In CS, that means do a lot of coding. Find programs to work on in your spare time, code some website backends, get to know programming well. There's nothing really specific you can do until you actually get here.</p>

<p>unlimitedx: Where did you hear that CS is impacted?</p>

<p>The first day of CS61A, Harvey said that he wanted more people in the program.</p>

<p>Since a lot of people aren't doing CS anymore, they've removed the entry exam.</p>

<p>It's not about being able to code, it's being able to think about how to code. My CS61C final was theory rather than code which threw everyone off.</p>

<p>It takes a lot of work to get a high GPA in EECS courses, you need to stay in about the top 15% of the class.</p>

<p>The good news is that it's hard to create good test problems so many of the problems on past exams are reused.</p>

<p>Maybe this is not up to date information:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/Peer/lowerdivision/%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/Peer/lowerdivision/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>How would I be able to view webcasts and old exams?</p>

<p>You can find webcasts at webcast.berkeley.edu</p>

<p>Exams are on the archives of class websites. <a href="http://inst.eecs.berkeley.edu%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://inst.eecs.berkeley.edu&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>The good news is that it's hard to create good test problems so many of the problems on past exams are reused.</p>

<p>Is this true?</p>

<p>My 61A TA's, who wrote nearly all the exam questions because Harvey's lazy, made special efforts to check each and every past exam on HKN to ensure that no questions were duplicates.</p>

<p>I haven't seen Spring 06's exams and with the exception of the Fall 05 final, the exams were similar.</p>

<p>Minor details get changed here and there but overall, if you knew the concept, you could answer the questions from any of the exams related to it.</p>

<p>In EE20, our problem sets were copied from exams of the previous semester.</p>

<p>DarkPyr0, did you have Varaiya for EE20N? He's the only professor I know that does that typically. And he's retiring. I wouldn't bet, in general, on problems being repeated from past exams. They can be good for studying (or utterly useless, if you're taking a class with Subramanian and don't have one of his old exams specifically), but I don't see much re-use.</p>

<p>BTW, a more convenient place to get past exams is at hkn.eecs.berkeley.edu. They aggregate them into one location rather than having to search through old websites.</p>

<p>Also, EECS is definitely not heavily impacted. It is easy to get into courses (they don't fill up). I've heard that it is difficult to apply into the major since it is highly ranked, but I don't know how true that is. Finally, while it's true that most CS exams are more theory than coding (since coding on paper sucks, and I think professors can appreciate that), I still think having good coding skills is a good form of preparation for CS in general. 61C is an exception because the course is more theory than coding, while 61A and 61B are more coding-centric, but you can't really prepare for theory if you aren't taking the course, so I'd say getting good at coding is the way to go.</p>

<p>I had Babak Ayazifar, cool guy. I think he's the only one that's teaching EE20 now since he's changing the course quite a bit.</p>

<p>Oh yeah, forgot that Ayazifar taught it last semester. I heard Varaiya was literally giving people in 120 a set of questions and saying that some subset would appear on the exam. He's one of two people I've known to ever do that (the other was a math prof).</p>

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unlimitedx: Where did you hear that CS is impacted?

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<p>Oh, it's definitely impacted. In fact, it is one of the most impacted majors on campus. As a junior transfer, you may be admitted to and matriculate at Berkeley, and then later find out that you are not admitted to the CS program. </p>

<p><a href="http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/Peer/lowerdivision/admissionsstatistics.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/Peer/lowerdivision/admissionsstatistics.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p><a href="http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/Peer/resources/cshandbook.html#juniortransfer%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/Peer/resources/cshandbook.html#juniortransfer&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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Also, EECS is definitely not heavily impacted. It is easy to get into courses (they don't fill up)

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<p>I believe we are using 'impaction' to mean how difficult it is to get into the major, not about how difficult it is to get courses. There is little point in getting courses in the major if you can't get into the major itself.</p>

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There is little point in getting courses in the major if you can't get into the major itself.

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<p>Eh. I'll give you an example. Haas offers no minor. However, I've heard about Haas professors advising undergrads who want to have some experience in business and either don't apply or don't get into the major to take 5 or so courses in Haas and write on resumes or what have you "Haas concentration" with a GPA near it. And then there are those who want to take courses around campus for fun or to experience something new, amongst other reasons.</p>

<p>It's just kind of hard to see CS being impacted when there is plenty of room in most of the classes.</p>

<p>
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Eh. I'll give you an example. Haas offers no minor. However, I've heard about Haas professors advising undergrads who want to have some experience in business and either don't apply or don't get into the major to take 5 or so courses in Haas and write on resumes or what have you "Haas concentration" with a GPA near it.

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<p>Well, first off, good luck in signing up for those 5 courses if you're not a Haas student. Haas is not only impacted from an admissions standpoint, but also from a course signup standpoint. Even Haas students sometimes can't sign up for the Haas classes that they want because the classes are full. </p>

<p>Secondly, I think you have to agree that, if nothing else, it's always better to actually be allowed to major in what you want to major in, as opposed to being forced to major in something you don't really want. </p>

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And then there are those who want to take courses around campus for fun or to experience something new, amongst other reasons.

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<p>Well, I don't know how valuable that is. Take Harvard or MIT. The truth is, anybody off the street can just sit in on most Harvard or MIT classes (especially the ones that don't require much student interaction), and nobody is going to stop you. Heck, it's unlikely that they would even know that you're not a student. </p>

<p>Furthermore, the truth is, for most courses anywhere, you can probably learn just as much, perhaps more, by just sitting at home and reading the book on your own time. Courses make a difference when the prof is a good teacher, and when you want to prove to employers or to grad-schools that you really do know the material of a particular course. For example, if you want to prove to an employer that you really do understand Fluid Mechanics, then taking a Fluid Mechanics class and getting a good grade in it is a good way to prove it. If you just say that you read the book on your own time, they probably won't believe that you really learned the material. And then of course there is the strong networking component - a vital aspect of all business schools. A lot of students go to business school not for the classes, but for the networking. </p>

<p>However, if all you care about is learning something or experiencing something new, then, in many cases, you don't really need the courses for that. Honestly, in many cases, all you need to do is read the book.</p>

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It's just kind of hard to see CS being impacted when there is plenty of room in most of the classes.

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<p>I think it's clearly true that CS could take far far more students than they have. CS certainly isn't resource-constrained. </p>

<p>I think the real issue is that CS doesn't WANT to take more students, probably because the department feels that by doing so, they would water down the quality of their graduates. In that sense, CS is basically an extension of the engineering colege. Yes, I know that CS is formally run by the College of L&S, but the truth is, CS draws upon many resources from the EECS department and that fact probably influences how they administer themselves. For example, the truth is, most engineering courses are not exactly filled to capacity. Engineering could probably take more students. But engineering doesn't WANT to take more students. </p>

<p>I have to believe that, sadly, this is a general indictment of the average student quality at Berkeley. For example, any undergrad at Stanford, MIT, or Caltech who wants to major in engineering/CS is free to do so. They don't have to undergo a separate admissions process into the major. You don't have the problem of students there trying to get into engineering and being denied and so being forced to major in something else. Wouldn't it be nice if Berkeley allowed all of its students who wanted to major in engineering/CS to do so?</p>

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Even Haas students sometimes can't sign up for the Haas classes that they want because the classes are full.

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<p>I believe you but haven't heard this from anyone. My group of friends aren't at the stage when this would be an issue (yet). In addition, I think many of the classes, especially the huge intro courses, are easy enough to get into, and these should probably be taken before more advanced things in the same subject anyway.</p>

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Secondly, I think you have to agree that, if nothing else, it's always better to actually be allowed to major in what you want to major in, as opposed to being forced to major in something you don't really want.

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<p>Sure, I agree. As a minor side note I don't think most students, at least before college, realize what the minimum (and often times maximum) amount of courses one will take in one's major. It's often a third and usually not more than a half of one's classes. But I don't diagree with you here.</p>

<p>
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I believe you but haven't heard this from anyone. My group of friends aren't at the stage when this would be an issue (yet). In addition, I think many of the classes, especially the huge intro courses, are easy enough to get into, and these should probably be taken before more advanced things in the same subject anyway.

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<p>A simple way to demonstrate this is to simply look at the upper division Haas courses through Telebears during the semester. Note how many of them will be full to capacity, with waiting lists and all that.</p>