UC Berkeley vs Princeton, CS PhD

[hiscoba]

HI, All,

I am an international application. Now I got acceptance by Berkeley's and Princeton's Computer Science PhD Program (AI field). I am not sure which program is better. Berkeley's CS program is more prestigious in the overall situation, but Princeton has a ideal professor who matches my research interest very well. Also, Berkeley's EECS is large and diverse, while Princeton's CS is small and focused. My career goal is to be a faculty in universities after graduate, or work in the research lab in international companies (like Google or Microsoft). Anyone give me some advise?

Thanks in advance.

Edited February 14, 2011 by hiscoba

[jprufrock]

I'd say go with Berkeley if you're leaning towards academia/professorship and with Princeton if you're leaning toward industry.

Berkeley's prestige and diversity of fields will help increase the size of your net when you job search as an academic whereas Princeton seems like it would prepare you much better for specific industry jobs in your field.

That said, I'm not in CS and I know nothing of the programs themselves. You probably can't go wrong either way.

I will say that Berkeley has a better job market location though, so perhaps it's not so clear cut.

[hiscoba]

I'd say go with Berkeley if you're leaning towards academia/professorship and with Princeton if you're leaning toward industry.

Berkeley's prestige and diversity of fields will help increase the size of your net when you job search as an academic whereas Princeton seems like it would prepare you much better for specific industry jobs in your field.

That said, I'm not in CS and I know nothing of the programs themselves. You probably can't go wrong either way.

I will say that Berkeley has a better job market location though, so perhaps it's not so clear cut.

Thanks for the comment.

P.S. I also have an offer from Computer Science Department of Carnegie Mellon University. Is CMU a better choice if I am leaning towards industry?

Edited February 14, 2011 by hiscoba

[shdwfeather]

Thanks for the comment.

P.S. I also have an offer from Computer Science Department of Carnegie Mellon University. Is CMU a better choice if I am leaning towards industry?

I'd say between CMU and Berkeley, Berkeley is by far the better choice for industry because of it's location. Silicon Valley is really ideal if you want to network in the industry because all the big companies have offices there.

That being said, I think a lot of your decision should be based on your specialization. For example, CMU has an excellent natural languages department, so even if I wanted to go to industry, I'd be hard pressed to let go of CMU.... (Although it looks like that scenario won't be happening for me. )

[was1984]

It really depends on your individual adviser, at least if you are hoping for an academic position. If your adviser at Princeton is better known and better connected than your adviser at Berkeley, you should go with Princeton. A well connected adviser at Princeton will help you connect with faculty positions and postdocs a lot better than a relatively unknown adviser at Berkeley.

If you are looking for an industry position, go with the school with the biggest brand name. In this case that would be Berkeley.