non-traditional background

[ralphmacchiato]

Hi gradcafe, i'm coming from a non-traditional background. Former software engineer from a top 20 school, graduated with near 4.0 gpa, worked for several years, etc. became an attorney graduating from a top law school, dislike it, want to get back into CS possibly through a masters program. Took the GRE this year and got a 166v/164q/5.5. A little disappointed with the quant score but maybe was out of practice. can possibly retake, but wondering in general how a top MS CS program will look at someone from my background? 

[free_radical]

I can't comment on the GRE or Computer Science programs specifically (except to suggest that you look at the average GRE scores for programs you're interested in), but I did apply from a non-traditional background (i.e. some time in industry).  The best piece of advice I can say is that in your SOP, you should really talk about why your time away from academia makes you a BETTER candidate.  How has your work experience prepared you beyond just someone coming in straight from a BS program?  For me, I talked about how my industry experience helped me solidify my research interests, and how my industry experience informed my decision to get a PhD.  

[AGradStudentHasNoName]

I think that you should be able to spin that pretty well. And with your pedigree (matters tremendously in CS) and very reasonable scores I doubt you will have to to get a top MS program. I think you would be a reasonable candidate for very good if not top PhD programs if you spin it well enough. I have some friends who are exactly in your same position. I told them not to get a Law degree. But to be fair, my CS friends told me not to get an MD lol. They were right. And now I am back doing computational biology in industry and will be applying to top PhD programs in cs/comp bio. I applied last year to top schools and got into 2 top 20 schools but none of the top 10. I turned both of them down because one I didn't like my potential advisors and the other was my undergrad and MD alma mater. I need a change. So I will re apply this coming fall doing much more preparation, reading papers, contacting profs, etc.

 

So you need to figure out how to spin it. I will give you one of my gems that is generalized enough for you to use too. I say "I went to undergrad with the plan of going to medical school but majored in computer science/computational biology because it is what I found fun and interesting. Turns out maybe what I find fun and interesting is what I should have always done. But since most people don't figure that out until after they retire, I figure I am ahead of the game."  Peaple eat that up. It works better in interviews than a personal statement, but it might be converted properly.

 

Also, you say that you want to get back into computer science, but you don't say what you want to do with it. If you don't want to do research and you went to a top 20 cs school, then you should do the following. 1. Really bone up on your coding skills. Probably take a few coursera courses etc. Also look into codility.com and try to be able to solve a few of those problems (some are easy but some are quite hard). Also get a book on coding interviews and read it. 2. Contact your old department and ask them if they can put you in contact with software company recruiters (most likely the companies pay the dept for the privilege of recruiting there and this will immediately get you interviews). Also contact your friends working in cs industry for leads. 3. Interview and get a job.

[ralphmacchiato]

I think that you should be able to spin that pretty well. And with your pedigree (matters tremendously in CS) and very reasonable scores I doubt you will have to to get a top MS program. I think you would be a reasonable candidate for very good if not top PhD programs if you spin it well enough. I have some friends who are exactly in your same position. I told them not to get a Law degree. But to be fair, my CS friends told me not to get an MD lol. They were right. And now I am back doing computational biology in industry and will be applying to top PhD programs in cs/comp bio. I applied last year to top schools and got into 2 top 20 schools but none of the top 10. I turned both of them down because one I didn't like my potential advisors and the other was my undergrad and MD alma mater. I need a change. So I will re apply this coming fall doing much more preparation, reading papers, contacting profs, etc.

 

So you need to figure out how to spin it. I will give you one of my gems that is generalized enough for you to use too. I say "I went to undergrad with the plan of going to medical school but majored in computer science/computational biology because it is what I found fun and interesting. Turns out maybe what I find fun and interesting is what I should have always done. But since most people don't figure that out until after they retire, I figure I am ahead of the game."  Peaple eat that up. It works better in interviews than a personal statement, but it might be converted properly.

 

Also, you say that you want to get back into computer science, but you don't say what you want to do with it. If you don't want to do research and you went to a top 20 cs school, then you should do the following. 1. Really bone up on your coding skills. Probably take a few coursera courses etc. Also look into codility.com and try to be able to solve a few of those problems (some are easy but some are quite hard). Also get a book on coding interviews and read it. 2. Contact your old department and ask them if they can put you in contact with software company recruiters (most likely the companies pay the dept for the privilege of recruiting there and this will immediately get you interviews). Also contact your friends working in cs industry for leads. 3. Interview and get a job.

 

Thanks for the really helpful response!  I've tried contacting some old contacts but my resume has just gone through the referral programs and fallen flat (don't think recruiters like seeing a long break).  I'm only applying to MS programs, not PhD programs, so maybe that is slightly less competitive.  Also wish i could have figured it out sooner, but I really like your catchphrase (which also happens to be 100% true for me).  My plan is to blend law and computer science into some fashion to automate the process of either parsing the law or providing automated legal advice. 

 

Good luck to you and your endeavors.  You sound like you're on top of it and will do great.