[Johns Hopkins vs UC Santa Cruz vs University of Florida]

Hi,

 

I have recently been admitted to the Master's program in Computer Science at these three universities. I am really confused about which one to join.

 

These are some of my basis for differentiation ( not in any order of preference):

 

1. Rankings - US News ranks Johns Hopkins (28)  > UF (39) > UC Santa Cruz (53) 

 Having seen these rankings, JHU is great for Natural Language Processing, but how good is it for other branches in C.S. ? How much does ranking matter for jobs? 

 

2. Coursework - The coursework seems to be more or less similar in all three, however, JHU has very interesting courses in NLP as compared to the other two and I like the subject, which is putting me into a dilemma. The positive point of UCSC is it gives more opportunities for innovation as most courses end in a 'research project'. 

 

3. Weather/Safety- UC Santa Cruz > UF > JHU

 

4. Jobs/ Internships - UC Santa Cruz probably has more opportunities since it is close to the bay area but not sure of how it would measure compared to the other two.

 

5. Research opportunities- These would probably be more at UCSC since JHU has clearly stated they do not give it to Master's candidates. 

 

I would be very grateful if someone helped me out with this decision.

[Profile Evaluation for MS C.S. Fall 2013]

Hi everyone,

I finished my undergraduation from University of Pune in July'2011. I worked for about 11 months as a web application developer after which I took a break to give my GRE, study some French and explore the field of computational linguistics ( I didn't have it in my undergraduate curriculum).I intend to apply for a master's program to schools that are reputed for NLP as well as data management (database management systems, information retrieval, data mining).

My profile is :

3.23/4.0 GPA overall , 3.37/4.0 major GPA

GRE : 160 Quant (760/800) 158 Verbal (580/800) 4.0 AWA

Toefl: 117/120

I have shortlisted the following universities :

Ambitious

Columbia

GaTech

CMU-INI & CMU-LTI

Northwestern

Moderate

JHU

USC

Univ of Colorado Boulder

UC Santa Cruz

Safe

ASU

Univ of Rochester

Indiana Bloomington

UFL at Gainsville

I have tried to enhance my profile by doing a course on algorithms on coursera and doing mini projects in NLP.

My questions are :

1) Is any one aware of the reputation of database research at Colorado Boulder and JHU ? Their NLP staff is pretty reputed.

2) Should I exchange one of the 'safe's with UMBC ?

3) Do you think my application may not even get processed in the ambitious universities ?

4) How is the quality of the C.S program in the moderate & safe ? I have done my research and find them pretty good, but I could do with a second opinion.

Please suggest any other univs that I could consider.

Thanks !

[Profile Evaluation for MS C.S. Fall 2013]

Hi everyone,

I finished my undergraduation from University of Pune in July'2011. I worked for about 11 months as a web application developer after which I took a break to give my GRE, study some French and explore the field of computational linguistics ( I didn't have it in my undergraduate curriculum).I intend to apply for a master's program to schools that are reputed for NLP as well as data management (database management systems, information retrieval, data mining).

My profile is :

3.23/4.0 GPA overall , 3.37/4.0 major GPA

GRE : 160 Quant (760/800) 158 Verbal (580/800) 4.0 AWA

Toefl: 117/120

I have shortlisted the following universities :

Ambitious

Columbia

GaTech

CMU-INI & CMU-LTI

Northwestern

Moderate

JHU

USC

Univ of Colorado Boulder

UC Santa Cruz

Safe

ASU

Univ of Rochester

Indiana Bloomington

UFL at Gainsville

I have tried to enhance my profile by doing a course on algorithms on coursera and doing mini projects in NLP.

My questions are :

1) Is any one aware of the reputation of database research at Colorado Boulder and JHU ? Their NLP staff is pretty reputed.

2) Should I exchange one of the 'safe's with UMBC ?

3) Do you think my application may not even get processed in the ambitious universities ?

4) Will a gap of a couple of months (after leaving work in June'12 till applications Nov'12) be thought of negatively ? I have mentioned all the NLP exploration that I did in that period in my SOP.

5) How is the quality of the C.S program in the moderate & safe ? I have done my research and find them pretty good, but I could do with a second opinion.

Please suggest any other univs that I could consider.

Thanks !