Tell me about the CS program at William and Mary

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP - not a cutthroat school. Lots to do and lots of good stuff to eat & shops within walking distance.
Morning runs through CW, tons of clubs, Greek life is great for mine but not necessary.
My DC is very very happy there
Good luck with your search

Is W&M good with merit for high stat kids who don't meet need or are they stingy like VT and UVA?

Nope--W&M offers virtually no merit aid--and has so many high stats kids it's hard to differentiate yourself that way. There are a couple of big merit grants each year. Others get funding for a summer project.
The one good $ thing about WM is that they are very good at funding kids with need, and will use grants when possible--I guess the other good thing is that most kids who wants one can probably find a research job on campus that pays $18-20/hr. My kid regularly did 10hrs/wk from Freshman spring on and then worked winter break and summer break. The nice thing is these jobs build up the resume and are real research work, not just an inflow of cash.

THIS! this carried on into Sophomore year for our kid too and next summer.

[Anonymous]

Anyone with kids actually studying CS at WM that can chime in here?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Something wrong with a list that has W&M CS above Cal Poly SLO CS.

+1 Lots of anomalies on that list.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Something wrong with a list that has W&M CS above Cal Poly SLO CS.

W&M haters just can't comprehend that the school is good at anything other than liberal arts

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP - I think it is honestly a very good program because it is not part of an engineering school and so students also have to take part in the liberal arts curriculum. I also believe it is now ranked higher than Mason's CS program

Lots of schools have CS in and out of engineering. And even kids at engineering schools have liberal arts core requirements.

Yes, but often times you can only get a BS through engineering. A BA is CS is less valuable for the average person. And yes again about the core requirements, but there are often also a lot of (unneeded) engineering core reqs as well thrown in - UVA engineering's program for example requires multivar, chemistry, intro engineering, intro physics. How is this useful for a software dev??

Because it's easier to do Software Dev for a technical company if you understand technology?
Really BA vs BS matter more what the student's interest is in. If your kid would rather take more LA/non-stem classes then a BA might be better. If your kid is a STEM kid, then (like mine), they'd rather take Physics and chemistry than 2 years of Spanish.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Anyone with kids actually studying CS at WM that can chime in here?

They graduate fewer than 100 students per year with a degree (BA) in CS, so not a huge pool to draw from on an anonymous board.

[Anonymous]

Do they even have a Computer Science program?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP - I think it is honestly a very good program because it is not part of an engineering school and so students also have to take part in the liberal arts curriculum. I also believe it is now ranked higher than Mason's CS program

Lots of schools have CS in and out of engineering. And even kids at engineering schools have liberal arts core requirements.

Yes, but often times you can only get a BS through engineering. A BA is CS is less valuable for the average person. And yes again about the core requirements, but there are often also a lot of (unneeded) engineering core reqs as well thrown in - UVA engineering's program for example requires multivar, chemistry, intro engineering, intro physics. How is this useful for a software dev??

Because it's easier to do Software Dev for a technical company if you understand technology?
Really BA vs BS matter more what the student's interest is in. If your kid would rather take more LA/non-stem classes then a BA might be better. If your kid is a STEM kid, then (like mine), they'd rather take Physics and chemistry than 2 years of Spanish.

You can do both at many places. My kid's friends who are in CS(BS) are also double majoring or minoring in things like theater, creative writing, design, music, modern language, psychology, etc. It is still possible to feed both sides of the brain while getting a BS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
If you need to go instate, but can't make UVA or VT, then do it.

It's harder to get into W&M then VT.

not for CS.

True. My friend's kid got into WM for CS, but was waitlisted at VT and rejected at UVA.

4.5gpa female, varsity bball, went to a "diverse" NOVA public school.

Damn my daughter doesn't stand a chance at VT for CS. 4.3 GPA, no scores, Varsity sports, and diverse NOVA public.

she stands a small chance, but if she hasn’t applied EA then it’s even smaller. No scores is the real killer with that GPA. we were told that Eng likes to see at least a 750 for math out of NoVA kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anyone with kids actually studying CS at WM that can chime in here?

They graduate fewer than 100 students per year with a degree (BA) in CS, so not a huge pool to draw from on an anonymous board.

So people on this board have no idea about CS at WM and yet they can inject their own opinions as if they are facts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
If you need to go instate, but can't make UVA or VT, then do it.

It's harder to get into W&M then VT.

not for CS.

Kids' stats are higher at WM.

not for CS.

2023-2024 According to their data page, Virginia Tech CS acceptance rate roughly matches their overall acceptance rate (57%) which is overall higher than W&M 36.5% rate.

Overall, VT's SATs are: 1250-1410, (54% submitted any standardized test scores)
WM are 1360-1510, (62% submitted any standardized test scores).
Overall average GPA at VT is 4.33 at WM it's 4.53.

So unless you can point me to a data page where the average CS kid at VT is above WM average overall GPA of 4.53 and mean SAT of 1450 (which is above VT 75th percentile)--there's nothing in this data that suggest VT is harder to get into.

you need to look at your schools scattergrams. Those numbers are not applicable unless you live in one of the adjacent counties to blacksburg or are an OOS applicant. VT does an AMAZING job giving preference to rural VA counties. Our schools admit rate is 20% mean GPA in 2023 4.55, mean SAT 1510.
W&M has a 40% ED rate for our school for male students. Wayyy easier to get in W&M for our kids, but nobody who is serious about CS would actually go there for CS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do they even have a Computer Science program?

W&M has a "One Year M.S. Program for W&M CS Undergraduate Students (4+1)". A heck of an option for a kid already coming in with AP/IB credits.

https://www.wm.edu/as/computerscience/graduate/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
If you need to go instate, but can't make UVA or VT, then do it.

It's harder to get into W&M then VT.

not for CS.

Kids' stats are higher at WM.

not for CS.

2023-2024 According to their data page, Virginia Tech CS acceptance rate roughly matches their overall acceptance rate (57%) which is overall higher than W&M 36.5% rate.

Overall, VT's SATs are: 1250-1410, (54% submitted any standardized test scores)
WM are 1360-1510, (62% submitted any standardized test scores).
Overall average GPA at VT is 4.33 at WM it's 4.53.

So unless you can point me to a data page where the average CS kid at VT is above WM average overall GPA of 4.53 and mean SAT of 1450 (which is above VT 75th percentile)--there's nothing in this data that suggest VT is harder to get into.

you need to look at your schools scattergrams. Those numbers are not applicable unless you live in one of the adjacent counties to blacksburg or are an OOS applicant. VT does an AMAZING job giving preference to rural VA counties. Our schools admit rate is 20% mean GPA in 2023 4.55, mean SAT 1510.
W&M has a 40% ED rate for our school for male students. Wayyy easier to get in W&M for our kids, but nobody who is serious about CS would actually go there for CS.

What a ridiculous statement

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do they even have a Computer Science program?

W&M has a "One Year M.S. Program for W&M CS Undergraduate Students (4+1)". A heck of an option for a kid already coming in with AP/IB credits.

https://www.wm.edu/as/computerscience/graduate/

? a lot of colleges have those programs, including UMD. And yea, my kid went in with 58 credits, and will be graduating early with a masters.

[Anonymous]

yes i don’t see why people say W&M is so competitive. I just checked our school. last year the acceptance rate was 44.4, the ED acceptance rate was 100% with an average 4.35 and 1310. No way in hellllll are you getting in VT engineering with those stats unless you have something really special.

My kid is also a stem kid, and W&M is not on his radar. it’s VT, GT, UMD, UTAustin, TAM, UF, and Auburn.

As someone in industry, I would NEVER ADVISE any kid to pursue any sort of engineering program (and CS sits in engineering schools) to go to a program that isn’t ABET accredited. My company won’t even hire an intern from a college that isn’t ABET accredited so we don’t recruit or consider W&M for internships.

I’m sure W&M is a great school just not for CS.