MS in DS/CS/Interdisciplinary DS programs (MSCAPP & MSPPM)

[postpunkenjoyer]

Hi everyone. I am currently at the very beginning of my journey about thinking about going back to school. I graduated two weeks ago with a BS in informatics and CS from a top 10 CS school. I have a 3.6 GPA and will work full-time as a software engineer starting in about a month. As of now, I plan to pivot back to school after around 3-4 years and in the meantime, I hope to make myself very competitive for master's programs in data science or CS.

I am particularly interested in the MSCAPP at UChicago and the MSPPM-DA at CMU. If anyone could offer insights on these programs and ways to stay competitive for them I'd greatly appreciate it. I plan on taking the GRE sooner rather than later after a few months of studying. I also have a professor I did ML research with that I'm hoping to use for a LOR. I think I could potentially use my manager at work for another LOR as well. I don't have the best grades in my math courses and was wondering if it would make sense to retake some of them through Edx. Any insightson these programs or recommendations for other programs to apply to would be immensely appreciated. I would be open to online master's programs as well.