#Milwaukee School of Engineering (MSOE) vs UT-Dallas - Computer Science

45 messages · Page 1 of 1 (latest)

tame seal
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If you're not thrilled about either of these options and are pretty much set on transferring, I would consider community college. The price will be far less than either of these places and will set you up for a strong transfer application.

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What state are you in if you don't mind me asking? Some states (ex: CA) have especially strong cc --> 4 year pathways

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one of the concerns with CC is missing 2 years of the traditional college experience but financially it could be worth it.

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yeah, sending love your way

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I think something to keep in mind is that in the future, when you have a high paying job in CS (which you seem to have the drive to achieve) much of this won't matter. CS is one of the relatively more meritocratic fields which means that you're less likely to be judged by the school you went to. I know it's still emotional to see your friends go off to prestigious institutions, but I hope you understand that college results aren't a measure of your intelligence or reflection of you as a person

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do you have a plan for what you'd want to do during a gap year?

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I'm actually taking a gap year, not to reapply, but to travel, work, and do the things I never got to do while in high school

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gap years have the potential to be a waste of time, but if you plan it out well, it could be a really cool experience

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yep, I completely understand. During my gap year I really want to learn more about who I am outside of an academic setting because my high school experience has just been studying nonstop

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you could make a rule for yourself that after the gap year, if you don't get in, you'll go to CC

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feel free to dm me if you need help brainstorming things to do during a gap year

fair cradle
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What is your goal of getting into a T20?

fair cradle
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really the school you go to won't define you

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nor will it stop you from getting internships or networking if you are cs

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it's more like the pride you get from going to HYPSM. At the end of the day it really only matters for finance or management/consulting position

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If it is your intent to transfer though, definitely go to a CC with a transfer agreement (such as CC's near WashU or CCC's which transfer to UC)

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well of course there's no guarantee for UCs

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the admission rate for cs is 2% or less at ucla, and switching in if you pick an alt is not allowed

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I should say for CS you are guaranteed at UC Riverside or Merced through TAG program and for any other major all UCs except 3 will have it for many other major

dense rain
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Maybe not yale for cs. Don’t get me wrong yale is a great school, but if you want to optimize on cs specific qualities, you should also look into some other options

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The thing is I don’t even believe this is true

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I think going to a “better” college for cs is going to mainly give 3 things, access to stellar education, abundance of opportunities, and a network

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However not all “top schools” according to the USA news actually give this

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You need to think about what you want to optimize on and how it will help you benefit your career

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I’m not going to point out specific schools because I don’t believe in shitting on anyone and really I don’t think there are any bad schools for cs education wise, unless you’re going to some really underfunded school with extremely terrible teachers

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I think the ivies are great for networking and opportunities for sure because of the name brand and alumni thing. Some ivies offer pretty cool curriculums, such as prioritizing diversity in your cs education (encouraging you to not just focus on technicality, but rather creativity and innovation, and taking courses that you’re interested in)

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So if your goal is to get a well rounded cs education that focuses not just on the technical aspect of cs, I’d recommend applying to the ivies (transfer wise), and specifically brown (cool open curriculum), cornell, upenn (m and t)

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Maybe Harvard too.. I can speak a bit about that since I worked at a lab there for a year and specifically interacted with many students/researchers there who told me about their education. It would be fine academically, you’d definitely get the brand and opportunities, their cs program is OK from what I’ve heard (definitely not the strongest out of the ivies), but I think this factor diminishes because I do believe you can take technical courses at MIT as a cs student at Harvard

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From what I’ve heard, getting an undergrad in cs from an Ivy (not including cornell tho) is good if you want to go to grad school, however if you’re aiming to just go into industry besides the networking aspects you would have gained, In the long run I honestly don’t believe your degree would be worth more than someone who went to a smaller and less known school

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If you want to more optimize cs education, you’d probably want to look at more “challenging” schools that focus a lot on either the theoretical aspect of cs or the industry part. It’s kinda up to you about what you prefer, some schools produce crazy SWE machines like Stanford (industry), some schools produce amazing problem solvers like CMU (theoretical)

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The education aspect is pretty important if you want to go into a competitive field because you need to be skilled enough to beat out your competition and to just be high value in general. I believe these top education schools for cs also come with an amazing brand and great network, and if you really want to see a difference in the opportunities you’ll get (bc tbh between all the schools in the USA, very few set you apart from others in long term job opportunities) I’d aim for the big four (Stanford, CMU, Berkeley, MIT)

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Honestly UIUC and cornell are comparable to the big four (but I don’t think you can transfer into UIUC cs anymore)

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If you’re from california, there are some AMAZING unis for industry including SJSU And SDSU, these schools are very reputable in industry and have starting salaries compared to UIUC which is insane

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Just my 2 cents tho: I worked with some crazy high school kids doing shit that adults would do later in their career. My friend who was 14 at the time was sponsored by I think udemy or coursera (some big course company) to develop his own self driving car. He derived this shit from his passion, and he showed it to other companies who took him as an intern even tho he was 14 and had no university degrees

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I interned at Harvard in a computational neuroscience lab, For a year ish. I was the only highschool student and to get the position I showed genuine interest and a portfolio that my supervisor happened to like a lot. I was 16 and I was never asked about my education what soever

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And while I interned at Harvard the name helped at first but more and more did I realise that later on people had cared more about what I was doing with my coding shit rather than just being an intern at Harvard

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Even before Harvard I had developed a network consisting of people from open ai, neuralink, yale phds, Harvard phds, and other companies just by reaching out as a 16 year old and saying hey I’m working on this wanna talk

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I’m not trying to flex but I think you should take away the point that some good brand name does only so much and people really care more about your contributions and visions

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I think people care a LOT les about where you attend than you think, and I think it’s just as easy to develop a network a top student at Harvard may have as someone who doesn’t attend Harvard (something that me, and other highschool students have done)

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You can transfer, it’s a valid opinion and completely up to you. At the end of the day you need to consider the value of your actions and how they will help you, but I do think you need to slightly change your mindset.

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If you go into university thinking about how you “failed” and are constantly focusing on transferring into prestige I don’t think you’re going to accomplish as much as you want

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Hoped my advice helped and if you want any more info on specific programs I’d love to chat more about it because I’ve done a shit ton of research here LOL

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But another thing, please don’t be too tough on yourself. Covid has made everything a shit show and you probably are a really cool talented individual. At a certain point this shit is a lottery 💗

fair cradle
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if your intent is still mainly Ivies, and you would not feel comfortable with the MSOE, UT-D names, I would honestly gap and reapply