Princeton, Yale, MIT or Stanford for CS

PtonAlumnus
Wed, 03 Apr 2013 19:08:36 +0000

Your son has fabulous choice to make. He will receive a great education at any of the four universities. In my opinion the top computer science departments are Stanford, Princeton, MIT, Berkeley, and Carnegie Mellon. You son will be able to find great CS students and professors at Stanford, MIT, or Princeton. Yale appears to be working hard to catchup with the best STEM universities.

MIT has had a very strong entrepreneurship program for a long time. MIT professor Edward Roberts has estimated that over 25,000 companies employing 3.3 million people were started by MIT alumni. Finance is very good at all four universities. Princeton’ program in entrepreneurship is growing. TigerLaunch is an entrepreneurship competition organized by the Princeton Entrepreneurship Club. Students present their business plans as they would to an “angel” investor or venture capitalist. Venture capitalists judge the student’s “pitch” and award the seed money. The 2013 TigerLaunch competition received over 100 entries for both the entrepreneurship and social entrepreneurship tracks. The prize for first place in 2013 will be $30,000. Many students in the competition have taken courses such as the High-Tech Entrepreneurship course or the course in social entrepreneurship. Dr. Greg Olsen, Entrepreneur in Residence offers researchers and students one-on-one advice regarding potential entrepreneurial endeavors.

Princeton is making a major effort to improve their courses in all of the creative arts. The Lewis Center for the Arts is the most visible part of a $300 million program to expand art education at Princeton. The university is now building a new center for the arts; the start of the center has been held up for years by a zoning dispute with Princeton Township. Have your son review the visual arts programs at the Lewis Center. See: [Visual Arts - Lewis Center for the Arts](Visual Arts - Lewis Center for the Arts) The Princeton Art Museum is a great museum to wonder through when you want to take a break from studying. [Princeton University Art Museum](http://artmuseum.princeton.edu/) Princeton has tried to make art a part of everyday life at Princeton; sculptures are placed around the campus. [Princeton University - Princeton sculpture enriches beauty and character of campus](http://www.princeton.edu/main/news/archive/S30/81/71I92/index.xml)

Princeton places more emphasis on undergraduate education. For a broad well rounded education your son would be happy at Yale, Princeton, and Stanford.

Your son should visit as many of the universities as he can. I expect that he will feel at home at one of the universities. There is no one best fit; he should attend where he is most comfortable.