Hmm… personally, if I could pick again of college, I would…:
- If I could get accepted to these ‘top’ places, I would considering attending IF the prices are reasonable. If you have to take on from around ~30 thousand dollars or more of loan in four years, I would ‘reject’ these phenomenal choices.
- Payscale is not the best place to 'rank' colleges. Colleges != pay. Pay has more to do with locations. And honestly, college is not a trade school. It is at the end of the day, a place for learning the abstract that you cannot realistically learn in the 'real' world.
- Payscale has questionable data. They state the net 20 year roi is $1,110,000 for Carnegie Mellon Univ. The ironic part is... Carnegie Mellon Univ CS starting median is: $105k with I believe around $25k worth of extra 'benefits'. https://www.cmu.edu/career/documents/Stats_2016_updates/One%20Pager%202016-BS%20SCS%206-Month%20Update.pdf That alone is hitting around almost $130k starting. In any type of math one does, the '20 year ROI' can be then gotten within ~10 years and this completely ignores the lucky 30% in Carnegie Mellon Univ CS who gets jobs in like Dropbox, Facebook, Quora, Amazon, Google, Apple who pretty much make starting almost $220k a year in total benefits. And assuming these graduates get 'promoted' within 10 years, the figures should not be $1,110,000 in 'net 20 years'.
In other words, Payscale data is completely off.
Either the school is reporting fraudulent data annually OR Payscale is not a reliable source.
- The number of 'companies' visiting a school DOES NOT matter. In CS, career fairs are almost pointless. Most if not all firms outright tell the students in career fair, 'apply online, we do not accept from here'. And the worst part is the resumes are read through a bot. It's mostly key words or key schools that get picked up in resumes unless you have some referral/connection.
- CS master's is not popular for students in elite schools. This is coming from a consumer in an 'elite school'. This is because solid bachelor's in CS in top schools generally do almost all the coursework of not only the bachelor's pre-req, but also the master's pre-req. In other words, it is not uncommon for CS undergrads in top schools to have mastered almost all the courses available outside research in an area. Because of this, the notion of 'cash cows' sprout for many master's program in CS as qualified CS undergrads go straight for PHD, not master's as the coursework required in master's is generally 'almost' finished and just not worth the time to spend 2 more years after undergrad. In fact, it is not uncommon for undergrads in elite schools to have learnt as much content as around 1.5 years of master's in a specific subset (some even more).
Grad school is mostly about research. Hence, the notion of ‘grad school’ in CS is looked down upon in the industry as a solid undergrad should allow the student to have taken all the requisites of a master’s in cs anyways (in a particular subfield).
Master’s and PHD are more about research than attending to ‘learn’ in CS. Most of the ‘learning’ happens in undergrad as CS is a relatively new field so there’s not that much content to have endless amount of courses for students to learn.
In fact, many of my friends will have studied more than the average master’s student in graduate level computer science in my school alone (even for the case with the master’s in my school). And I do believe companies are somewhat aware of this in top schools.
- First job in software side is mostly about connections and elite schools do have the connections of 'breaking in' for the interview A LOT easier than not-so-elite schools. http://www.pgbovine.net/advantages-of-name-brand-school.htm Reality hits hard. After that, not so much. It's then mostly about your most recently worked firm... which the second tends to come from your first job and etc (induction rules). Anyways, the software industry is pretty egalitarian so in terms of ROI, I do not know nor do I care.
- Elite schools tend to challenge its students 'a lot' in which most schools just cannot do. If this matters for your child, so be it. But then again, this can also mean your child 'can' mentally break down at a top school (e.g. feel depressed at times, etc.).
- The programming required for industry is more or less not taught in universities. It's a CS degree. Not a programming degree. Maybe 1 or 2 introductory courses are helpful but the stuffs one learns in CS is overkill for the industry. So other than the 'more challenging' courses in CS, elite schools sadly does not prepare much for Industry. In fact, the schools you mentioned could actually be more industry based than 'elite schools' simply because of this matter. I believe elite schools are more geared towards research and non-elite public schools are geared towards jobs.
- Software industry is a pretty egalitarian field (i believe I stated this before). Once you can 'get' the interview, the rest is up to you. Universities DO NOT matter from this point. In other words, if your child can secure interviews, college degree names are more or less worthless in getting hired. However, do note 'getting' an interview is extremely difficult. I heard from Adobe a few weeks before that they get about 2~3500 applicants annually and they just cut it down (with a bot) to around ~150 and then start interviews from there. Elite schools tend to pass the 'filter' of these bots but it is not a guarantee.
- In terms of PURE ROI, I think a full scholarship is almost always better. But life is not about money. If you can afford it and you are not breaking your bank (or anywhere close to that), it does not hurt to give your child 'world class academics' surrounded by the brightest peers in not only the country, but the rest of the world. Again though, this could also be 'bad' in the sense in that your child could come to have inferiority complex as he/she could become rather depressed and feel dumb/incapable. Big fish in a small pond or a little fish in a big pond. I always firmly believe that being a little fish in a big pond is far better as, 'birds of the feather, flock together' but it is something to consider.