CS masters with mediocre GPA

sLazy
Tue, 05 May 2009 17:53:47 +0000

I currently attend University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and have GPA of 3.4 (technical is right around 3.3).

I have one mediocre(?) research experience, and I will have an internship experience this summer.

Do I have a chance of masters program at top 20 CS schools (Stanford, CMU, MIT, UPenn, UIUC, Michigan, UT Austin, etc)? I plan to attend school for one more year (hopefully have more research experience), and plan to take GRE this summer (I get around 1400 on practice exams).

Also, what can I do to improve my chances?

I also heard that graduate schools are a lot tougher to get in due to recent economic recession, is this true?

Thank you for your help in advance.