Colleges for Non-Competitive Achievers

Mombot
Wed, 16 Jul 2008 01:21:43 +0000

My son is very similar and I don’t think the word “uncompetitive” is quite right. These guys are introverts.

His scores are almost identical to DS’s scores. I think you will be surprised at how “competitive” he is at the right kind of school.

CS is offered almost everywhere. There are two basic approaches: a math based CS program, which is available at a LOT of LACs, and CS programs affilated with a college of engineering, which is typically at a university.

ANY CS degree is very marketable, so there is no advantage in “shopping” for a “highly ranked” CS degree. That is just stupid–if a kid is willing and able to major in CS they can go to ANY college with the degree and they will manage to find gainful employment upon graduation.

I would sit down with one of those search programs and look for CS programs and see what you find. The lib arts programs that are the descendants of math depts tend to be more focused on programming, where the ones affiliated w/ engineering schools have that as well as hardware, electrical engineering and info architecture branches.

If your son likes the mathy stuff you are in a good place because you can look at schools that do not have the engineering programs. My son is more about hardware and building things so we are looking at CS programs that reside in an engineering school. Frankly that is a lot harder for this type of kid.

IF he is willing to consider CS outside of a college of Engineering I’d be all over liberal arts schools who offer the CS degree. With his grades, stats and interests you could get a lot of attention at schools that are 60% or more female. I will do some googling and if I find anything interesting post it later.