| Oh sorried "impacted" is the word they use for overcrowded. It means that you have to apply for the major and if your grades aren't good enough they won't let you in.
CMU is a bit different. I'd say it's more pre-professionally oriented than most colleges. That has good and bad aspects. You apply to different schools, and so you start off with the assumption that your major will be one of the ones that school offers. Kids do switch majors and schools - but some schools are harder to switch into because of course requirements. The School of Computer Science is one of the hardest to get into, but is therefore also not generally as hard to switch out of. SCS also requires every kid to have a minor, so you could easily do a physics minor. (That's what Mathson is on track to do now - subject to change of course - he's a freshman.) CMU has some breadth requirements, but if you've taken APs and gotten 5s you can get out of an awful lot of them. There should definitely be room in his schedule for fun courses as well. On the plus side they have excellent job placement. Because it's a school not a department there seems to be an extra level of attention to the students. They bring in interesting speakers (like Bill Gates this week.) For a focussed kid it's a great place. |