Carnegie Mellon or Virginia Tech?

[Anonymous]

OP - Most of the best CS driven students in the country and internationally have CMU on their applications list. If your daughter has the choice, I would not use your office coworkers as the benchmark for whether CMU is worth it. The gap between the schools has widened considerably from your days. There are tech giants building campuses in Pitt to recruit the CMU kids. I haven't heard the same for VA tech.

[Anonymous]

CMU is the mothership for CS. There's no arguing that.

But if you can't afford it, then why even have her apply? If you can, then sure go for it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:well, my kid's CS teacher said to him when my kid was evaluating engineering schools:

* which one would you rather be at if your major doesn't work out for you?

This is excellent advice. I wish someone had said that to me when I was in high school. I went to an engineering-specialized school, and then realized I didn't want to do engineering. Ooops!

[Anonymous]

Do you want your kid to just work where you do? Then VT is fine. Personally, my kid hated CMU vibe and I’m now spending the money for UIUC. It’s working out and it’s worth the money to us. YMMV

[Anonymous]

CMU CompScien students are in great demand. Friend's son graduated from CMU and went to one of the FLAGs two years ago. Starting salary was $150K plus $40K bonus.

It is very hard to get into the program. DS's friend won a DOD Hackathon and did not make it into CMU.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP - Most of the best CS driven students in the country and internationally have CMU on their applications list. If your daughter has the choice, I would not use your office coworkers as the benchmark for whether CMU is worth it. The gap between the schools has widened considerably from your days. There are tech giants building campuses in Pitt to recruit the CMU kids. I haven't heard the same for VA tech.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:well, my kid's CS teacher said to him when my kid was evaluating engineering schools:

* which one would you rather be at if your major doesn't work out for you?

This is excellent advice. I wish someone had said that to me when I was in high school. I went to an engineering-specialized school, and then realized I didn't want to do engineering. Ooops!

He was a truly awesome teacher. Very glad we had him in my son's life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:well, my kid's CS teacher said to him when my kid was evaluating engineering schools:

* which one would you rather be at if your major doesn't work out for you?

this is good advice

Can you please elaborate that statement? Seems like 200k is an expensive experiment.

There's nothing to elaborate. My son was making a similar choice about different schools (not the ones mentioned, but similar differences). He asked a question, he got an answer.

My son did not discuss our financial situation with his high school computer science teacher.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:well, my kid's CS teacher said to him when my kid was evaluating engineering schools:

* which one would you rather be at if your major doesn't work out for you?

this is good advice

Can you please elaborate that statement? Seems like 200k is an expensive experiment.

VT weeds out kids in the engineering school and in CS (which I think is also in that school). It is prudent to think about what happens if you can't cut it /hate it in engineering at any school but especially at the state schools that weed kids out.

I can't comment on what $200k means to you, since some of us have it and some don't. As a rule of thumb for helping a kid choose among engineering schools, it is a good one.

[Anonymous]

Does he intend staying in VA or south after college? Then VT is fine.DC would need a masters anyway so save money for grad school.

[Anonymous]

I graduated CMU a million years ago when CS was only offered as part of Electrical Engineering - CS or Applied Math-CS. I think the EE-CS still exists but the alternative is in Information Systems is based in Dietrich H&SS, with a humanities core. This may be important to your DD's decision.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:well, my kid's CS teacher said to him when my kid was evaluating engineering schools:

* which one would you rather be at if your major doesn't work out for you?

this is good advice

DC is an athlete weighing an offer from an Ivy and Public Flagship that is ranked top 20 in DC's sport (Academically the flagship is v good but not tippy top on US News). $$ is not an issue bc our financial aid situation will make the Ivy affordable and so will the scholarship the flagship offered.

I am trying to provide advice to DC while giving enough space to make the decision. I changed this sentence above to "which one would you rather be at if your sport doesnt work out."

[Anonymous]

as a PP noted, VT weeds out engineering kids. They let in the kids that have good stats, but 1-2 courses in they really find out who is not cut out for VT Engineering. I think if your kid gets into CMU (and only then is this whole debate even a consideration), but then you can be pretty confident cMU thinks he needs to be there.

These numbers are the whole school, not just Cs, but can give you an idea.

cMU...freshman retention 96%, 6-year grad 89%
VT - freshman retention 93%, 6-year grad 84%
VT -

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:well, my kid's CS teacher said to him when my kid was evaluating engineering schools:

* which one would you rather be at if your major doesn't work out for you?

this is good advice

DC is an athlete weighing an offer from an Ivy and Public Flagship that is ranked top 20 in DC's sport (Academically the flagship is v good but not tippy top on US News). $$ is not an issue bc our financial aid situation will make the Ivy affordable and so will the scholarship the flagship offered.

I am trying to provide advice to DC while giving enough space to make the decision. I changed this sentence above to "which one would you rather be at if your sport doesnt work out."

Congratulations to your very very accomplished child!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:as a PP noted, VT weeds out engineering kids. They let in the kids that have good stats, but 1-2 courses in they really find out who is not cut out for VT Engineering. I think if your kid gets into CMU (and only then is this whole debate even a consideration), but then you can be pretty confident cMU thinks he needs to be there.

These numbers are the whole school, not just Cs, but can give you an idea.

cMU...freshman retention 96%, 6-year grad 89%
VT - freshman retention 93%, 6-year grad 84%
VT -

Some critical thinking is required here. VT is a public school and hence must accept more in-state kids. There are a lot of families who can’t even pay in-state tuition - sometimes family circumstances force a kid to leave or they lose their scholarship. VT also has the corps program - dropping out means withdrawal from school. CMU is a private school - people who go there already lined up loans etc.