I believe that when it comes to CS programs, there is relatively little difference in outcomes for most students whether they attend an elite program, or just a highly respected program. If your goal is to work at say Google, you can certainly get there from CMU, Stanford and MIT, but you can also get there from Alabama or San Jose State.
The second thing to note is that UW-Madison is considered extremely good in Computer Science. Not that US News is a perfect gauge of rankings, but they do rate UW-Madison as #11 for its graduate CS program, which is of course excellent.
In terms of elite schools and merit, you may want to give Vanderbilt a shot, which offers full tuition scholarships to a small set of admitted students (Duke does too, even full ride ones, but they are considerably more selective). The real advantage of a place like Vanderbilt over UW-Madison is not the strength of its CS department, but that almost all of its departments are strong, allowing students to switch majors and still end up with a highly respected degree. That option doesn’t exist at say Alabama.