How does limited enrollment result in less access to classes? My understanding of limited enrollment is that the major is selective and not everyone is admitted. Whereas, if its not limited you can select it as major without meeting any minimum requirements. Do you have a student at UMD?
Thanks. My point was specific to CS Majors. Internship some/anywhere or other is okay to get but being in these top of the class C-Schools comes in with expectation to get internship at a FAANG or such. And it is these internships that put them apart come senior year /Jobs. That said, GA tech also co-ops if that makes OP’s decision any easier.
GA Tech: + Highest Visibility in Tech Industry + Weather - Highest Rigor - Food/Quality of Life
UMD: + Cyber Security/Defence IT Opps + Moderate Visibility/Rigor - Safety Issues outside of campus (DC/Baltimore!)
NEU: + Co-Ops+Most Popular College City(Boston) - Dorms/Housing - Reputation(confusing identity with million locations) - Cost
UWisC: + Great School Spirit + Moderate Visibility/Rigor - Weather
UMN: Low Visibility nationally but regionally its well known.
Programmer here. The average college student changes their major at least twice, so I would avoid sending her to a school paying triple the tuition for a ridiculously employable degree like CS. There’s literally no benefit. A decent in-state university should be more than sufficient to land her a good computer job. Computer and tech is all about on-the-job training and hands on experience. After about 3 years, she’ll be worth about 30-50% more and employers don’t even ask where you went to school.
The following link has a list of Business Minors at UMD, some of which may fit very well with a CS major.
UMD is far from Baltimore. There is no safety issues in regards to that. DC is about 30 minutes or an hour away depending on where you go in DC. The crime is mostly in a certain area of DC and has been like that for the 49 years that I’ve lived in the area. The crime in DC does not bleed onto to the UMD campus. There are 3 other major universities near the DC crime area and you never hear about them. Georgetown and GW are in DC as well. UMD has its own campus police, blue lights, escorts, and safety measures.
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Most schools allow co op today including UMD, Wisc, and UMN. It may be in the spirit of NEU, Drexel, Cincinnati, but most every school allows. My son, while interning, worked with an Ole Miss co op. So if a student wants that, they can have anywhere.
I think the world is no longer just about Faang.
I know many kids at many fine companies such as Garmin, retailers, car manufacturers and more. And they are easily getting next internships or jobs after the first.
Some still like startups.
Expectations of what to get should belong with the student. It’s their career. Not to a school’s rep.
Hopefully they land a good experiential opportunity (not all are) that then leads to further.
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For the LEPs at UMD, some classes may be restricted to only students in that major and some classes may give priority to the students in that major.
For non-LEP majors, such as History or English, a student just applies for that major and is in it (there may be a minimun GPA requirement). However, ALL majors at UMD have GPA requirements that must be maintained. If not, the student is dropped from that major. Both my D and her husband were in LEPs at UMD
Thanks for the clarification. This makes sense. I think this is how I remember the school being.
There is no difference in rigor or visibility between any of these schools.
I do not have a student there. However, my understanding of limited enrollment that only students for the major can have access to the class required for major… This is case in Gatech too (I do have student there). Students with the major have priority… all other students even with minor have difficulty to register for the classes.
I think you are totally confused.
I live in metro DC.
UMD is 8 miles from DC line. College Park is not in the best part of metro DC (look on the map to see locations).
Georgetown University is in Georgetown part of DC, the best and safest area of DC.
George Wahington does not have campus. But it is also in relatively OK area.
I am not telling you that UMD is very dangerous area, but outside of it is far from very safe…DC has so much crime now that it asked for help from Federal government (at least what I have heard on local radio 2 days ago while driving).
This does not mean that you can’t visit DC or everyone needs a gun to feel safe.
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I’m not confused. I work in DC. I’ve also lived in the DC metro area my entire life (49 years). I think we have very different perspectives of the area. We can take this conversation offline if we need to. But what happens in DC does not effect the UMD campus. Galludet, Howard, and Catholic Univ surround the area you are probably referring to. DC is going through a transitional period because the federal government employees have been working remotely since the pandemic. As a result, a lot of DC businesses, metro use, have closed and declined. But this has also occurred in the Virginia areas where the pandemic shut down businesses and never opened up again. There are shopping centers in my area in Virginia that are completely empty. There are proposals to figure what to do about these spaces in DC. But again, none of this impacts the UMD campus, which is in Maryland. The whole area is changing and evolving and has been throughout the many years (i.e. FBI headquarters is moving to Greenbelt, MD. That’s right next door to College Park.)
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It is not true that in " limited enrollment that only students for the major can have access to the class required for major" UMD has a very clearly defined process to allow students to transfer into limited enrollment majors. This process includes taking actual limited enrollment classes and getting a specific specific grade, or better. Both my D and her husband took limited enrollment classes, without being in a limited enrollment major, in order to transfer into a limited enrollment major. You can find the process for transferring into any LEP at UMD with a simple google search The classes taken are the same classes that the directly admitted LEP students take, in the same classroom, with the same professor. Some students even fulfill the LEP transfer course requirements with AP credits.
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I guess my question would be - when I hear avail of classes is -
regardless of your status -
are there enough sections that everyone can get the classes they need.
Or enough electives.
At my daughter’s school they have fantastic sounding classes in the catalogue - but that doesn’t equal quantity of sections or frequency (a class offered every two years isn’t good).
So regardless of major type (LEP or not), I was thinking that’s what people meant by are the classes avail…
Last year, I don’t remember exactly when, I looked at the actual number of classroom seats available for UMD freshman who were either directly enrolled in CS or freshmen who might want to transfer into CS. This info is available on UMD’s Testudo Schedule of Classes
https://app.testudo.umd.edu/soc/
I looked specifically at the CS “Gateway courses” that have to be taken by students who want transfer in and these same courses are typically taken by new CS freshman.
Here is what I found:
In the Fall 2022 Semester UMD had 405 new freshman directly enrolled in CS. The Gateway Courses are CMSC131, CMSC132, and MATH140.
UMD offered 1,088 seats for CMSC131, 610 seats for CMSC132, and 1,018 seats for MATH140.
So, they were clearly prepared to accommodate more students than those directly enrolled in CS.
I expect that other LEPs are comparable and maybe most non-LEP majors.
Of course, there will always be some courses that have a limited capacity
As for electives, there are lot of those at UMD but again some students may not be able to one that they want.
Overall, I feel that UMD makes sufficient resources available to most students to enable them to graduate in their majors in 4 years.
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I was doing some due diligence on crime at the schools my daughter was planning to attend, and I found this tool with crime stats. You can look up the individual schools to get an idea. How Safe Is University of Wisconsin - Madison? Learn About Campus Crime Statistics
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These are the USNews undergrad CS rankings for these schools:
GA Tech - 6
Maryland - 18
Wisconsin - 22
Minnesota - 33
Northeastern - 45
As all are top-50, I suspect all are adequate for your purposes.
I would choose based on fit and finances.
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Please see this about UMD CS Fall 2024
“ I plan to apply as a freshman for Fall 2024 admission to the Computer Science major. What should I do if I am admitted to the University but not to the major? Can I transfer to the major at a later time?
Students admitted to the University but not to Computer Science MUST be prepared to select an alternate major. There are many other computing majors at UMD including Geospatial Data Science, Immersive Media Design, Information Science, Information Systems, Social Data Science, and Technology and Information Design. Students may also be interested in one of UMD’s other 100+ majors or 80+ minors. Many programs offer coursework that include courses in information technology, programming languages, and data science.
It is highly unlikely that students will be able to change majors to Computer Science at a later time. Current students who wish to change their major to Computer Science after matriculating at the University would apply as internal transfers. We expect to have no more than 100 spots available to external and internal transfer students each year. Students who wish to change their major to Computer Science must complete the Gateway requirements and the LEP application will be reviewed for selective admission.”
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Since OP’s daughter has been admitted to CS she’s all set. She doesn’t have to worry about LEP requirements.
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