CS: What are some of the good LACs or small colleges?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Union is good and actually has real engineering as well not just software weenies

Union? Come on, another Bucknell

Not everyone is shooting for the moon here! Union is a great opportunity for good kids

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Mudd/Pomona if you can get into the lottery and Grinnell.

Not really worth it otherwise.

+1, but even Grinnell is also heavily lotteried, esp students targeting CS + Stats / Data Science

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mudd/Pomona if you can get into the lottery and Grinnell.

Not really worth it otherwise.

-1 Williams cs is okay and swat is great for CS PhD

Who wants to go to grad school for CS? CS professors are WAY underpaid and the good tech work is done in private industry

Yes, with great salaries and research opportunities for people with PhDs..

[Anonymous]

Denison

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mudd/Pomona if you can get into the lottery and Grinnell.

Not really worth it otherwise.

What is this getting into lottery?

Pomona has a lottery system (which btw, I’ve heard noise of it dropping soon due to professor hiring, any news?) to randomly select students who can become CS majors. This was after more than 20% of one of their classes declared CS majors.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mudd/Pomona if you can get into the lottery and Grinnell.

Not really worth it otherwise.

What is this getting into lottery?

Pomona has a lottery system (which btw, I’ve heard noise of it dropping soon due to professor hiring, any news?) to randomly select students who can become CS majors. This was after more than 20% of one of their classes declared CS majors.

They’ve hired a tenure track professor and have been searching for an open rank and visiting professor. The issue for Pomona is it’s in California and only can pay $100k for assistant profs, which is much lower than industry pay for a PhD in CS.

[Anonymous]

Very useful thread, really helpful.

What I gather so far on some the best/nice are:

College / challenge or issue
Pomona - heavily lotteried
Swarthmore - heavily lotteried
Grinnell - middle of nowhere / internship issues / lotterried
Harvey Mudd - very competitive / low acceptance rate

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What are some of the real good LACs or small colleges for computer science? + also good creative writing

Want to avoid greek / frat culture

Carleton and Swarthmore are great options. They both are repeat regional finalists in ICPC competitions, both place well into CS PhD programs, and both have strong writing/humanities programs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mudd/Pomona if you can get into the lottery and Grinnell.

Not really worth it otherwise.

-1 Williams cs is okay and swat is great for CS PhD

Who wants to go to grad school for CS? CS professors are WAY underpaid and the good tech work is done in private industry

Yes, with great salaries and research opportunities for people with PhDs..

+1

Most CS PhDs end up industry and use their training for innovative R&D. Those who think PhDs are only for academia are poorly informed.

[Anonymous]

Hamilton

[Anonymous]

Harvey Mudd
WPI
Lafayette
St. Olaf
Union
Smith
Swarthmore

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are some of the real good LACs or small colleges for computer science? + also good creative writing

Want to avoid greek / frat culture

Carleton and Swarthmore are great options. They both are repeat regional finalists in ICPC competitions, both place well into CS PhD programs, and both have strong writing/humanities programs.

There’s no incentive to getting a PhD in CS- that’s a massive cut to your salary for not much pay increase with a detrimental time sink. This indicates that swarthmore cs grads aren’t learning enough to get jobs in industry. Swarthmore also has a long lottery with waitlist and caps for your course load- that’s not worth the cost.
You know whose also great at the ICPC competitions, better than swarthmore? UCSD. Competitions don’t mean anything of substance- Princeton hardly gets any Putnam placements, and it’s the best math program in the world.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are some of the real good LACs or small colleges for computer science? + also good creative writing

Want to avoid greek / frat culture

Carleton and Swarthmore are great options. They both are repeat regional finalists in ICPC competitions, both place well into CS PhD programs, and both have strong writing/humanities programs.

There’s no incentive to getting a PhD in CS- that’s a massive cut to your salary for not much pay increase with a detrimental time sink. This indicates that swarthmore cs grads aren’t learning enough to get jobs in industry. Swarthmore also has a long lottery with waitlist and caps for your course load- that’s not worth the cost.
You know whose also great at the ICPC competitions, better than swarthmore? UCSD. Competitions don’t mean anything of substance- Princeton hardly gets any Putnam placements, and it’s the best math program in the world.

+1, getting a PhD in cs is silly. Worth it only for the top 0.1% who’ll go into quant finance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Mudd/Pomona if you can get into the lottery and Grinnell.

Not really worth it otherwise.

Midd actually places decently into the FAANGs. A Midd CS grad is an engineering/product VP at Google as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mudd/Pomona if you can get into the lottery and Grinnell.

Not really worth it otherwise.

-1 Williams cs is okay and swat is great for CS PhD

Who wants to go to grad school for CS? CS professors are WAY underpaid and the good tech work is done in private industry

Yes, with great salaries and research opportunities for people with PhDs..

CS PhD is 400k plus right out of school at Meta.