Meeting demand at strong CS schools is a problem, and Berkeley (as well as some other big names) does have some issues here.
Williams does not have that issue - it has small classes delivered by it’s modest CS faculty (8 professors ). Small class size, intimate learning environment is one of the key value propositions of a LAC.
However, the CS curriculum at Williams is neither broad nor deep while Berkeley’s is. So it seams reasonable to say each school is delivering an experience that will appeal to different students.
I mean relatively few REQUIRED CS courses for the major. Amherst’s major has only 9. I read Carleton and Williams have 8 or 10.
My point was, a double major is easier than perhaps at a U where many more CS courses are required for the major.
Your point I think is more about the number of courses/sections and size of them and demand for them. Good points but IMO these often favor LACs. My D’s Intro Comp Sci course section had a 40 student limit and was taught by a professor, lab had 20. It’s a different sort of experience there.
UCB CS 61B for fall 2017 currently has 308 enrolled out of 650 seats, with 152 on the wait list. Most discussions have open seats. http://classes.berkeley.edu/content/2017-fall-compsci-61b-001-lec-001
The existence of students on the wait list is presumably due to the department policy of giving specific groups of students (those in relevant majors or first and second year undeclared students) first chance to register for the course; others can only initially get on the waitlist, which is then processed at the beginning of classes. https://eecs.berkeley.edu/resources/undergrads/cs/degree-reqs/enrollment-policy
Unless there is a surge of additional demand, it looks like UCB CS 61B will easily be able to accommodate all of the waitlisted students with room left over (although some discussions may get full earlier).
Just from your example, it looks like Williams CS 136 (already closed) will be harder to get into than UCB CS 61B (plenty of room to let all of the waitlisted students in). Of course, the current state of class registration may not necessarily reflect actual offering, since departments may add more sections of popular classes or cancel less popular classes, or move classes to different rooms to increase class size and capacity.
Echoing what @OHMomof2 and @tk21769 have said, I think it’s interesting to note that Swarthmore, which runs an ABET approved engineering program, has only one major in CS and it’s strictly on the liberal arts side of the ledger:
Started watching Last chance U and have seen the 30 for 30…30 for 30 was very interesting since my dad grew up in that time and area so I had heard many stories. Last chance is pretty good so far.
I did not get through all 14 pages of this thread. I worked and hired in a comp sci field designing and implementing complex software for 10 years. My husband has done the same for going on 30 years. I have a BS in Math and Comp Sci from a competitive large flagship. He has a BS in Comp Sci and a MS in Software Engineering from another competitive tech school. There is a HUGE difference in the tech skills of those out of the BS programs and the LAC BA programs graduates as new hires. However, the LAC program graduates tend to be more well rounded and better suited for management/team work in many cases in both our experiences. I think there are benefits and drawbacks to both types of programs.
@MusakParent Lol, that’s playing it right down the middle. So essentially the BS from the large flagship or tech is preferable for software designers right out of college but LAC graduates for management? Also if you have time could you list IYO the benefits and drawbacks of each?
So this debate rages on, on another thread as well. So let me ask if money were no object and you could have chosen or could choose any college to study computer science, what would be your top 5 and why?
Berkeley
Carnegie Mellon
MIT
Stanford
University of Illinois at Urbana Campaign
Why is the same for all:
Course rigor
Faculty strength
Facilities
Diverse student body with driven students from around the world
Culture
Partnership with tech firms and investors
Those are the top 5 of my son’s list. Total size of his list was 13. It did not have a LAC. He was very particular in his goals to the point of looking at sample schedules from each school and searching faculty lists for recognizable names.
From the other thread, I looked at Bucknell, Union, and Amherst. Of those 3, Bucknell looked to be the best of the 3 LACs from a curriculum point of view. My opinion.
Berkeley
Carnegie Mellon
MIT
Stanford
University of Illinois at Urbana Campaign
I’d swap Michigan with UIC but the top-4 are the same and should be the same for anyone answering the question. If you want to argue Harvard or Princeton for number 5, that’s reasonable, but no LAC will be in the top-10.
“From the other thread, I looked at Bucknell, Union, and Amherst. Of those 3, Bucknell looked to be the best of the 3 LACs from a curriculum point of view. My opinion.”
Agree, Bucknell looked to be the best of those three, they also have a solid engineering program to complement the CS.
We visited Williams College recently. They are expanding the sciences building. According to the tour guide, CS is one of the biggest major now and the top employer for their graduates is Google.
On another thread, some one recommended Grinnell and Swarthmore as well.
HarveyMudd : overall academics, undergraduate focus, support for diversity, student diversity in majors, backgrounds, and outlooks, location, access to west coast companies
Stanford: same as above but less undergraduate focused and less focused on diversity in tech so a step down from Mudd
Harvard and MIT: same reasons as Stanford, except with snow
Williams: same as Harvard and MIT, ranked the same in my mind due to undergraduate focus
In my (clearly unpopular and apparently uncommon) opinion, purely academic specialization is for the Master’s level, undergraduate studies are for intellectual and personal growth. Excellence and outstanding learning can be found aplenty at all of the above.
Almost all bachelor’s degree granting schools in the US require a major as part of the bachelor’s degree requirements. While they may have some ideas regarding student intellectual and personal growth, which may be reflected in their general education requirements or other policies, they do not see that as mutually exclusive against the student taking some academic specialization through choosing a major. Indeed, some or many schools may see intellectual and personal growth as including the ability to study a particular subject (one’s major) in depth (or in more depth than someone just sampling a few courses in the subject).