Kleene

I do not have the impression that a CS Master in a top school in the US is hard to get in to. For many universities the Master is their cash cow. These are the universities that offer virtually any unsuccessfull PhD applicant admission to the Master. I did not apply to any US Masters for this particular reason. Of course, not all US Masters are like this, at all. But I was set on getting the best education, including stimulating peers. It did not feel I my best option was a cash cow, even apart from the fact there was no way I would pay for that. So apart from that I think you hardly need anything to get in there (a bit exaggerated, some might argue, but reasonable grades and standardized test scores may suffice for cash cows), top grad schools/programs in CS (I am more thinking of PhD now) tend to give much weight to (relevant) research experience. You need tangible results. That may be papers published or GitHub projects you have contributed to, that sort of things. It will always remain a crapshoot for selective programs. I agree with you that sometimes people getting in are not the ones you would have expected to. I have the impression that sometimes 'arrogance' (lacking a better word) is a reason why people do not get in. Especially in CS, where you can work on a lot of projects out side of university, some people have a tendency to think they are someone while they are not. A realistic attitude has more chance of getting you in than such an arrogant air that obviously obfuscates your personal statement. This might give you some more insight: http://jackman.stanford.edu/papers/pa04.pdf

I have two months off. I am actually planning to try and stay at my undergrad institution to do some more research. Is that an option for you? Stay with your current supervisor, for instance? Assuming that you just graduated from another course. EDIT: So I am not planning on following Maleficent's advice. I usually prefer to have something to do. Traveling would be great (I will be traveling for 4-6 weeks this summer), but I at least need some occupation.

They were my teachers. I was their student. I had 15 teachers, they had a 150 students. That's it. Although my school was not too big (100 students per year) and the teachers and students were generally quite close. I was a bit of a guinea pig, since I was the first student they allowed to do the things I did. If I had been my own teacher, I would have wanted to know how that turned out, because in some way they took quite a risk. I have contacted some teachers, and some teachers have contacted me after graduation for one thing or the other. Last time I spoke a teacher was two months ago and he wanted me to keep him updated. Last year they posted something on the school website about an award I had won. On top of this, I think any teacher would be happy to receive a sincere thanks from any student. Honestly, I am not worried about that. And even if they don't care, no harm is done.

The point is that it is not just individual teachers. Okay, it's 4 teachers that did the most for me. It's all my other teachers that also supported me (like, 20 in total?). It's all teachers in the school for doing a bloody good job in guiding and supporting weirdo's like myself. My thanks do not only go to the teachers that helped me in particular, but to all teachers (including some new ones I may not even know) that make this school as awesome as it is. May be I should send the 4 teachers a personalized letter and have one posted in the teacher's lounge.

Does anyone have experience with a written thanks to your high school? I have thanked individual teachers after graduation (two years ago) and thanked them in my yearbook piece, but I feel that I want to send the school a letter now that I am getting to the next stage of my life. You see, my high school prevented me from dropping out by sending me to university early. Thanks to them I am now about to graduate from university and will be leaving the country for a world top 5 university. I owe them my sanity, if not more. What would you recommend? I would like for my former teachers to read it, but also other teachers and staff if they wish since it is as much a testimony to the individual teachers as it is to their collective effort as a school. Therefore, I consider addressing the letter to the teacher's lounge. Do you think that would be the way to go? Thanks!

I am with you on the shortening ambiguities. It is often convenient is some ways/cases, but it might raise other questions. In my case if I say "Maths and CS" or "combined Maths and CS", people might think I will be studying for two separate degrees. In undergrad I studied two separate degrees for a while "CS" and "Linguistics", but then people thought it was a combined degree. :S Anyway, I noticed that referring to my new course as "theoretical CS" is useful for people in the know. Lay people will be left wondering WTH theoretical CS is.

I got into the college of my preference (Balliol). I have been told that at this point it is unlikely that I will receive college funding since these are more often awarded in conjunction with university funding. The results will probably go out within two weeks.

Ok, I am cheating a bit. Since I live in Europe, we pay 2500 dollars for a year's tuition regardless of the number of credits you take. Unless you are from outside the EU or studying for a second degree, then we can charge you up to 10 times as much. We don't even have caps and gowns. We just dress fancily. Just wondering, what's the norm of who to bring to the graduation ceremony? Parents, siblings, more people? I understand you got/get to bring 4 people.

Just wondering whether someone can top the length of the title of the course I will commence in the fall. I already had issues with it not fitting into text fields (even in the University's own forms). How long is your (longest) degree title without the "MS in" or "BA in" part? Mathematics and the Foundations of Computer Science (45 characters w/o blanks)

I am from the Netherlands, though I am in a completely different field. As I understand it, American PhDs from the top schools (HYPSM + some great schools in your field, if you stay in academia) give you a plus. Most American PhDs are not looked favorably upon but neither are they an impediment. They are considered PhDs like all others. The Netherlands are general quite open for academics from abroad, so you should be fine in this respect. They are probably more interested in you research than the school you are from. I have no idea about how the promotion system officially works, but there is no such thing as tenure track. You can be an excellent researcher working in academia for 30 years and never becoming a prof. I believe this is different than in the US, but I could be wrong. All (?) Master's programs in the Netherlands are taught in English. I am inclined to think that all Bachelor's in English literature and/or linguistics are also taught in English. At least the one at my university is. You should be fine in this respect too.

Maybe it's weird, but we don't have graduation fees at all.

We graduate with only our own class. There are 40 CS students. It is supposed to take place in September, after the new year has started. We had a freshmen graduation, which is a bit weird from a US perspective. In my country it is not normal to pass all your classes. If you pass less than three quarters you are kicked off the program. In my class 50% passed their first year, so we had a sort of ceremony to celebrate.

No, it does not affect college placement. Current undergrads do not get their degrees before May/June/July/August anyway (depending on your institution).

As far as I know linguistics is rarely taught in high school, but there do exist competitions. These competitions are mainly about finding patterns in obscure languages and applying them to new data. More about the US competition: http://www.naclo.cs.cmu.edu/ I took a year's worth of linguistics courses. I actually wanted to double major in linguistics and CS, but the linguistics department turned out to be quite rigid in their requirements to attend lectures despite maintaining a 4.0 GPA.

*did research *tutored *involved in academic extracurriculars *took college classes I am not a sock puppet nerd. In fact, both of my parents barely graduated high school. My sister did not graduate at all. All of them not because of a lack of intelligence, but because of an aversion to school. Unfortunately, I 'inherited' this aversion. Particularly middle school and high school were hard on me. Somehow I have a very hard time being forced to 'study' material I mastered years earlier. Therefore, I always tried to spend my time in school doing something useful. Otherwise I would feel like crap and be exhausted all the time. So I joined the science club, participated in maths and linguistics contests, etc. I enrolled in university part-time. Other than that I did absolutely nothing but trying to get through the day. At 16 I was very close to dropping out, depressed and such. Eventually I graduated early to live up to my full nerd potential at university. Ever since I have been a true nerd. At the moment I am officially taking courses, doing research and working for a total 105 hours a week. I have no life other than studying, researching and teaching. But hey, I am a nerd, gotta enjoy it. The bottom line: I am a nerd. I love to learn. However, before full-time university I had never experienced that learning could take place at school, of all places!

I got my college offer for Balliol twelve days ago (almost three weeks after being offered a place on my course). It was in fact my prefered college. As far as I understand, most university wide funding (Ertegun, Clarendon, etc.) has gone out completely already. If you have not heard by now, you are unlikely to receive any this year. I am hoping for college funding or HEFCE funding, but funding will not be a dealbreaker. HEFCE funding wil be released in June, college funding obviously depends on your college. Best of luck to all of you!

1. As far as I know quantitative is more important, but do not count on universities being more lenient because you are a non-native speaker. Eventually you will be able to master the same material, so if your verbal skills lack they might just as well pick someone else. Verbal scores are usually seen in perspective with your TOEFL/IELTS results. It may be a problem if both are a bit low. If you check the results search you see that some applicants with below 150 verbals did get in. 2. In Europe it is pretty rare to have any research experience beyond your undergrad thesis. As long as you did one research project you should be fine. Publications are not expected at all in Europe. You should be fine for ETH. 3. Three research projects (one relevant), 4.0/4.0 GPA, IELTS 8.5 (which is about equivalent to 115 TOEFL), Pre-University College, Honours College, a year's worth fo linguistics courses, prestigious summer school, teaching assistant. 4. I got an offer for the Oxford course in Mathematics and the Foundations of Computer Science. I choose it over ETH for a number of reasons. The foremost reason is that I have a lot more to learn in Oxford. The Swiss education system is pretty standard and similar to the one in my country, while Oxford has the tutorial system and in this particular course examines only by means of written projects. Written projects are much more similar to the research I intend to pursue later. Hence, they are more useful than written exams. On top of that, housing in Zurich is hard to come by. If you want to pay a reasonable price you will have to live far from the university. Not only does this make socializing relatively hard, it would also imply long commutes. I have been commuting 75 minutes one-way for the last six years, so I would love to try the campus life for a change. I am not the most outgoing person, so I think Oxford's college system would benefit me. Another factor would be the fellow students. In Oxford even UK nationals need awesome credentials to get in, while in ETH Swiss students get in no matter what. Given that half the ETH MS student body is Swiss, I believe the standard in Oxford are higher. 5. Personally, I do not think you need any more experience than you already have unless you have to compensate for irregularities in your CV or transcripts. 6. Tuition fees in ETH are virtually non-existent. Living in Zurich is rather expensive though. I am not sure how hard it is for internationals to get a job, but I know that you are not allowed to stay after your study unless you have a job. Switzerland is quite strict in that regard. 7. You are aware that PhDs are usually funded? You are not supposed to go into any more debt for the PhD, so I am not exactly sure why you would want to postpone a PhD. I read in the results search that someone got an offer for a 70.000 CHF stipend at ETH which is ridiculously much. I seriously wonder whether that might be a typo. If that is the true amount this guy got offered, you might be able to save up while doing your PhD at ETH. Getting in for a MS is by no means an entrance into their PhD. Best of luck to you!

I committed to Oxford.

I have officially committed to Oxford and Balliol College.

I got admitted to ETH (the MS in CS). It seems like an amazing program, but I decided to go with a better offer. I got 170Q and 162V, also an international student and a non-native speaker. What do you want to know? When do you intend to apply?

Some people have received offers, but not all have been sent out yet. They intend to inform recipients by mid April. Anyone from the Mathematical, Physical & Life Science division heard back yet? I am asking since offers seem to be made per division.

I am not entirely sure about the competition, but I strongly suspect it since Swiss nationals do not need awesome grades to enroll in the Master's. Since 50% is Swiss in most Master's courses, the competition would be less stringent than in Oxford were everyone needs similar high grades. In fact, admission for ETH graduates is unconditional. Even more, if Switzerland is anything like the Netherlands virtually everyone will proceed to the Master. I am interested in a very broad range of topics in theoretical computer science and I am not completely sure what I would like to research. I will definitely look into the available courses and supervisors again!

Wow, I would really send an email to expain your intentions. Not for your sake but rather such that UW might give more appropriate responses to people with similar requests in the future.

I share your concern about the social aspect of the course. You will probably end up hanging out with other international students rather than with Swiss students, since they will inevitably speak German all the time. Still, I would not be concerned with not being able to understand them. I have not experienced any trouble understanding Swiss-German before. But indeed it will impede social interaction no matter how you put it. Have you checked ETH's housing website? Even if you have not accepted your offer yet, you can see some of the things available. Everything is extremely expensive (in Dutch terms anyway). If you want to pay less than 1000 CHF, you will probably end up outside of the city and commuting each day. This would not contribute to your social life either. The University Housing is very limited. Since students that require a visa to enter Switzerland have precedence over the rest of us, you probably should not count on getting it. Plus, you will probably go have to Zürich at the beginning of the summer to be there in person to secure housing. It seems hard to do this from a distance. It has been done before, of course, but since it is not University Housing you may not be entirely sure what you end up with. In short, I am not looking forward to going through this trouble.

I am studying at Leiden University. No, the language is not an issue for me. If anything, it is an advantage that I would learn fluent German in Zürich. I suppose you are not Dutch yourself? Most Dutch people understand German fairly well, since it is so similar. It is just speaking that is another cup of tea, but in no way I experience it as a barrier. Just like you I am not sure about pursuing a PhD. At the moment I am pretty certain, but I reckon my ideas may change during the Master's. My considerations are learning (short-term) on the one hand and PhD/career prospects (long-term) on the other. Of course, there is the practical difficulty that it is virtual impossible to find housing in Zürich while in Oxford I am almost guaranteed housing. I have got a on it too.