Is AP Comp Sci A a good indicator of what a Comp Sci major is like?

Matachines
Wed, 07 May 2014 18:26:42 +0000

No. If I recall right from high school, AP CS is just “learn Java”, with superficial approaches to stuff like recursion, OOP, etc.

A proper CS degree isn’t a programming degree. In fact, in a lot (maybe most?) of your classes you won’t even touch a computer. Computers are the TOOL of Comp Sci. You will take classes on Discrete Math, Data Structures, Algorithms, etc where you will not need a computer except maybe to test stuff. It’s a lot of math as well, but it’s not really Calculus, it’s discrete math. High schools do a terrible job of teaching discrete math (actually hey don’t teach it at all) so that students who were good at Calc or Algebra do poorly in logic, set theory, proofs, and discrete math classes in general. However, if you work hard and truly love math, you can do well.

I suggest you watch this video from 0:28 to about 3:50.

Lecture 1A | MIT 6.001 Structure and Interpretation, 1986 - YouTube;