Grad school options, Computer Science

[dxkj]

I've been trying to decide whether or not to go to Grad school right after I graduate, but the job market has kinda encouraged me to go that route.

The problem is, I still dont know exactly what I want to do, IE narrowing down my range.

How does this work in grad schools? How many different Compsci programs are there, etc? People keep telling me I need to know where I want to go before I apply for a grad school, so i guess I need to


Im sick and my head is all fuzzy today, so dont pick on me for making no sense.

 

[gopunk]

well just about any reputable university will have a phd program in computer science... not really sure how else to answer your question. they have a list of rankings in u.s. news and world report for starters (rankings... heh).

what are your grades? have you done research as an undergraduate?

 

[Kipper]

CMU, MIT, Georgia Tech, Berkeley, and a few others come to mind...

 

[dxkj]

Not really - research

My school isnt what you'd call a typical CSCI school. For a while math/csci were the same department, kinda still are. When I started going here there were 2 compsci professors.


Grades? Made an oopsie one semester mainly. Got screwed on rent by some roomates and I had to work 65 hrs a week. I was taking 17 credits that semester and doing well until halfway through, then it went downhill fast.


Grades in my major- 3.5

Overall GPA when I graduate, hopefully around 3.2-3.3. Not stellar.

 

[dxkj]

Originally posted by: MadCowDisease
CMU, MIT, Georgia Tech, Berkeley, and a few others come to mind...

Right, but my question is "Why do I need to know exactly what I want to do in the area of Computer Science before I go to Grad school? Do they have a bunch of separate programs that I would have to pick from?"

 

[gopunk]

when are you graduating? you're kind of starting late if you wanted to enter grad school next year... so if you're going to apply next year (and not this year) i would try to do some undergrad research in the meantime so that whatever faculty member you do it with knows about your research capabilities well enough to write about it.

 

[DaveSimmons]

"Why do I need to know exactly what I want to do in the area of Computer Science before I go to Grad school? Do they have a bunch of separate programs that I would have to pick from?"

Because different schools have faculty that are doing research in different areas. If you are interested in say, AI, and go to a school where no faculty are doing AI research it will be very difficult to work in that area for your PhD. It's actually worse than that since AI is a wide field, you might want to work in computer vision and the faculty only do planning.

And it also matters how busy the faculty are: when I went to UW a decade ago the 2 professors doing graphics research already had all the grad students working with them that they could handle, so doing graphics research wasn't really an option for new grad students until some of the existing ones finished up.

If you're sure that you only want a MS and not a PhD then it doesn't matter as much since you won't do much research anyway.

 

[DaveSimmons]

year... so if you're going to apply next year (and not this year) i would try to do some undergrad research in the meantime so that whatever faculty member you do it with knows about your research capabilities well enough to write about it.

excellent advice, especially if you're thinking PhD.

 

[CanOWorms]

Originally posted by: dxkj

Originally posted by: MadCowDisease
CMU, MIT, Georgia Tech, Berkeley, and a few others come to mind...

Right, but my question is "Why do I need to know exactly what I want to do in the area of Computer Science before I go to Grad school? Do they have a bunch of separate programs that I would have to pick from?"

You need to know which concentration area you're going to focus in. They will have the CS programs split into different fields - Artificial Intelligence, etc.. I'm not sure what the different fields in CS are. But like in EE it would be Signals and Systems, Solid-State, Photonics, Electromagnetics, etc. What fields they offer depends on where you go. You don't take that many courses as a Grad student, so the majority of the courses you take need to be in your concentration area.

 

[dxkj]

What is this "research" you speak of? You mean picking a field and researching it? (yes Im assuming thats what you mean, I am seriously brain dead today, feel free to post whatever and I should understand it tommorrow)

 

[DaveSimmons]

Originally posted by: dxkj
What is this "research" you speak of? You mean picking a field and researching it? (yes Im assuming thats what you mean, I am seriously brain dead today, feel free to post whatever and I should understand it tommorrow)

As an undergrad you learned existing knowledge by reading books. If you're just studying for an MS it's about the same except you move on to more current (and less pre-digested) knowledge in research papers.

As a PhD-track student you're learning to create new knowledge in some field, and to clarify existing knowledge. You should check out Communications of the ACM at your school library, look at the list of citiations at the end of each article. You might also talk to a faculty member who has taught a subject you liked (graphics, compilers, whatever) and ask them for copies of a couple of recent research papers in that field. To get a PhD you need to reach the level where you can write papers like that yourself.