Merit Scholarships

uf2019
Sun, 15 Mar 2020 05:10:20 +0000

@PPuggle Congratulations to your daughters for getting accepted to all these wonderful colleges. For CS, MIT is probably the way to go if money is not an issue ($75,000/Year) followed by Georgia Tech ($55,000/Year). If finances are a concern then it is a toss up between UF & UCF. UCF will match or exceed any UF scholarship offers especially for girls interested in CS. If your daughters love competitive programming, then as a member of the UCF programming team you are part of an elite club and the internship opportunities are exceptional (Facebook, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Lockheed) recruiters are always on campus making offers to the team members. The CS culture at UCF as part of the programming team is exceptional and they also pay a monthly stipend in addition to the Scholarship. If you take the programming team out of the equation it is a toss up between UF (#7 ranked public school, Research) UCF (Great Location (Orlando vs Gainesville) and Internships).

My son loves the culture of the UCF programming team and has been friends with team members and instructors for many years. He faced the same tough choices last year as he loves competitive programming but unfortunately competitive coding is only a small part of the overall CS education. My advise would be to visit all these colleges and choose the one which is the best fit for your daughters. Good luck on making your decision. I am sure they will be successful in any of these great colleges.