My kid is a rising sophomore at Pitt. He was directly admitted into the SCI (the computing, IT college). He has done well in getting into necessary CS classes. He is on the waitlist for one this fall, but number 3 or so so he thinks he will get in that class. Going forward he said it will be much easier to get into CS classes because he was able to officially declare his major (CS) after last semester. Pitt holds a number of seats for the CS majors in class.

His classes have not been huge. He is very happy there.

Back to my point, UMich classes are packed tight. It’s tough getting into stats and data science. A lot of classes are closed completely. CS itself has some intro openings but the major itself is limited enrollment.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The better private universities.

Stanford
MIT
Princeton
CMU
Duke
Rice
Northwestern
Hopkins
Penn
Cornell

A lot of publics might be better ranked in CS, but it's a pain and a slog getting a degree with so many 500/1000+ intro classes. Berkeley alone has CS classes with more than 1700 students.

My DC graduated from Berkeley in 3 years with double major in CS and Econ w/o any summer courses. Don't believe the crowding BS. Only the 3 intro CS classes are large lecture/discussion sections. DC also was able to take graduate courses in AI, machine learning etc. as an undergraduate w/o any hassles which was great.

+1000

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I assure you there are no honors classes, no seminars for freshmen, no writing requirement classes, or really much of anything open at UMich. Nothing. All these offered classes don’t really exist at the school.

He’s written for some overrides but for most departments it’s not considered unless you’re on the waitlist. And most waitlists are closed. He’s number 50 on the waitlist for some intro classes.

EECS intro classes are open! [/quote]

PP. Honors 241 Honors Core Writing in Humanities has openings for Honors College students. There are other first year writing requirements classes that have blocks on open seats. These will probably be released soon for the final weeks of advising. Look for Writing 160. There are also some places available in Freshman seminars tonight. Quirky topics, but that's what's fun about college![/quote]

He’s not in honors—didn’t feel like applying and I didn’t feel like I the parent should be managing that.

He has a decent schedule now but none of the major prerequisites are available. It’s pretty weird when you can’t take the data science, stats, or economics intro classes. Or honors intro classes. No freshman writing either. his deal to get overrides but as the payor this is pretty weak for a costly school.

I was reading that the new UMich grad student contract has the LSA cutting back on its GSI discussion leads. Maybe that’s the problem, some departments have run out of money for new sections. [/quote]
Why kids pay private school tuition to go to Michigan is beyond me. Just go to WPI, get the classes you want, and enjoy the 20k a year merit aid.[/quote]

PP you admit your kid's schedule is fine. Your kid is not in honors but somehow you are concerned that honors classes are not available. I explained to you that there is a huge list of first year writing classes that will have seats released within the next three weeks. Your kid can watch for those and swap a class if warranted. You continue to be concerned that some classes are not available right now even though your kid does not need them. However, I'm sure you realize that no larger school can realistically cover 100% of freshman demand in one semester. Some kids have to take some things in spring.

If you read the GSI thread on Reddit, they are predicting impact on classes that Law grad students teach. I don't think this sounds like a critical problem for a Comp Sci major. It might be for my kid's major. But he got all the classes he wanted for fall. And in the spring he plans to take the classes you mention above (Econ, Stats).

It is probably not too late to switch to WPI if you and your kid would be happier there. Why plan to transfer later? There are mentions on this board of people leaving dorms and withdrawing at last minute from various universities to go elsewhere. It seems to be possible.

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I assure you there are no honors classes, no seminars for freshmen, no writing requirement classes, or really much of anything open at UMich. Nothing. All these offered classes don’t really exist at the school.

He’s written for some overrides but for most departments it’s not considered unless you’re on the waitlist. And most waitlists are closed. He’s number 50 on the waitlist for some intro classes.

EECS intro classes are open! [/quote]

PP. Honors 241 Honors Core Writing in Humanities has openings for Honors College students. There are other first year writing requirements classes that have blocks on open seats. These will probably be released soon for the final weeks of advising. Look for Writing 160. There are also some places available in Freshman seminars tonight. Quirky topics, but that's what's fun about college![/quote]

He’s not in honors—didn’t feel like applying and I didn’t feel like I the parent should be managing that.

He has a decent schedule now but none of the major prerequisites are available. It’s pretty weird when you can’t take the data science, stats, or economics intro classes. Or honors intro classes. No freshman writing either. his deal to get overrides but as the payor this is pretty weak for a costly school.

I was reading that the new UMich grad student contract has the LSA cutting back on its GSI discussion leads. Maybe that’s the problem, some departments have run out of money for new sections. [/quote]
Why kids pay private school tuition to go to Michigan is beyond me. Just go to WPI, get the classes you want, and enjoy the 20k a year merit aid.

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I assure you there are no honors classes, no seminars for freshmen, no writing requirement classes, or really much of anything open at UMich. Nothing. All these offered classes don’t really exist at the school.

He’s written for some overrides but for most departments it’s not considered unless you’re on the waitlist. And most waitlists are closed. He’s number 50 on the waitlist for some intro classes.

EECS intro classes are open! [/quote]

PP. Honors 241 Honors Core Writing in Humanities has openings for Honors College students. There are other first year writing requirements classes that have blocks on open seats. These will probably be released soon for the final weeks of advising. Look for Writing 160. There are also some places available in Freshman seminars tonight. Quirky topics, but that's what's fun about college![/quote]

He’s not in honors—didn’t feel like applying and I didn’t feel like I the parent should be managing that.

He has a decent schedule now but none of the major prerequisites are available. It’s pretty weird when you can’t take the data science, stats, or economics intro classes. Or honors intro classes. No freshman writing either. his deal to get overrides but as the payor this is pretty weak for a costly school.

I was reading that the new UMich grad student contract has the LSA cutting back on its GSI discussion leads. Maybe that’s the problem, some departments have run out of money for new sections.

Anonymous wrote:I assure you there are no honors classes, no seminars for freshmen, no writing requirement classes, or really much of anything open at UMich. Nothing. All these offered classes don’t really exist at the school.

He’s written for some overrides but for most departments it’s not considered unless you’re on the waitlist. And most waitlists are closed. He’s number 50 on the waitlist for some intro classes.

EECS intro classes are open!

PP. Honors 241 Honors Core Writing in Humanities has openings for Honors College students. There are other first year writing requirements classes that have blocks on open seats. These will probably be released soon for the final weeks of advising. Look for Writing 160. There are also some places available in Freshman seminars tonight. Quirky topics, but that's what's fun about college!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The better private universities.

Stanford
MIT
Princeton
CMU
Duke
Rice
Northwestern
Hopkins
Penn
Cornell

A lot of publics might be better ranked in CS, but it's a pain and a slog getting a degree with so many 500/1000+ intro classes. Berkeley alone has CS classes with more than 1700 students.

Of that list with CS issues, Cornell ( https://cornellsun.com/2023/01/31/computer-and-information-science-students-struggle-with-course-enrollment-adding-stress-instead-of-classes/ ), Penn ( https://www.thedp.com/article/2019/03/computer-science-classes-coding-ivy-league-upenn-philadelphia ), Johns Hopkins (https://www.jhunewsletter.com/article/2017/02/over-500-waitlisted-for-comp-sci-classes ), Duke potentially (https://www.reddit.com/r/duke/comments/n0905v/duke_cs_concerns_is_it_really_as_bad_as_some_say/ ) and Rice potentially ( https://www.reddit.com/r/riceuniversity/comments/4h32r9/how_is_rice_cs/ ).
It has been a nightmare at DC's college, Umich, and I am very pessimistic about colleges ability to change this.

Can you elaborate? DC (rising senior) has never had issues with getting a class he wanted, is on track to graduate this semester with a minor. Several of his friends have already graduated (in 3 years) without issues.

Hey, DC just graduated from Mich! It's not a graduating issue, but likely a fit issue. He chose to go to a university, because he was advanced in computer science and wanted grad-level coursework/PhD (and the support wasn't great also takes forever for office hours in some courses). By his junior year, the courses he was looking to take all were immediately gone with long waitlists, and he felt like he was still scrambling after underclassmen years. It's definitely softening after first year admission restriction changes. By the time he wanted to try out grad school courses, he was met with a lot of resistance and realized it wasn't going to happen.

Entering UMich student for the fall and also having a really terrible time with the basic STEM classes kid wants. Like there is not even a waitlist. All honors classes completely full, no waitlist. Can’t take prerequisite intro classes. And he’s entering with a lot of AP credit so not sure what to take.

For the high OOS price he may just transfer after this first year.

All big schools are like this. Sad they sell one story to applicants and yet another reality exists.

Incorrect

Examples? It would help OP!

Maryland

UMD has restricted CS majors to 600 direct admit students, and 100 to transfers. It used to be something like 1400 total class size.

I don't think they will have too many issues with not being able to classes.

Yeah but no chance to get into CS if not direct admit. I wouldn't "hope for the best" with the 100 transfer slots.

Pick a school like WPI/RPI/CWRU/Rochester that allows your kid to major in whatever they want. No programs are direct admit (except perhaps nursing which is a strict 4 year program and has to have space for clinicals) Then your kid can major/minor in what they actually want, not what the school allows them to

That's true, but OP was asking for CS programs that aren't overenrolled. But you are correct, UMD CS admit is *tough*.

William and Mary has 40 students max in each of their Intro to Programming sections.