Here are some tips for selecting schools, based on an analysis comparing each school to all others across dozens of factors:
Schools Concentrating On Software Engineers For Applications
- Focus: For schools with a focus on this career area, look at Quincy College, Harvard, Wentworth Institute of Technology, and Holyoke Community College.
Fastest Response From Schools
- Request Info: For the fastest information for prospective students, look at the Spotlight schools on this page.
Student Body
- Part-Time: For schools emphasizing part-time studies, consider UMass Boston, Wentworth Institute of Technology, Bridgewater State, and Fitchburg State.
- Female: For schools particularly welcoming to female students, consider Mount Holyoke College and Smith College.
- Diverse: For a diverse student body, consider Atlantic Union, Endicott, Bunker Hill, and MIT.
- Adult Learners: For lots of adult learners, consider Atlantic Union, Fitchburg State, Cape Cod Community College, and Springfield Technical Community College.
School Setting
- Out of State: For geographic diversity, take note of Harvard, MIT, Smith College, and Hampshire.
- Dorms: For a residential campus environment, take note of Bard College at Simon's Rock, Amherst, Williams College, and Mount Holyoke College.
Excellence
- SAT: For students with high SAT scores, look at Harvard, MIT, Tufts University, and Amherst.
- % Accepted: For selective institutions, look at Harvard, MIT, Amherst, and Williams College.
- Class Size: For small class sizes, look at Williams College, MIT, Amherst, and Smith College.
Student/Alumnus Reviews of Schools for This Career and State
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Boston University • Boston, MA
Studying Computer Science (completion in 2008)
• 7/9/2011
"It prepared me well for work. I enjoyed my time there."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | It's a great school in a great location. The program is very helpful to your future career. |
| Program Reputation | 6 | I'm not certain how we stand on national rankings. Our facilities are great, however. |
| Program Quality | 8 | It's not MIT. However, it's still a wonderful and elite program. |
| Instruction | 8 | The professors were knowledgeable and intelligent. And they were very approachable. |
| How Difficult | 7 | It was a fairly rigorous program. However, I'm pretty good with math so it wasn't a huge challenge for me. |
| Hands-On vs. Bookish | My major in particular required a lot of hands on learning. I don't know much about the other majors. | |
| Schedule Flexibility | 7 | It's a normal schedule like any other. There was a surprising amount of interdisciplinary programs. |
| Academic Facilities | 7 | Our school takes care of its students. The facilities and buildings are practically new. |
| Social Life | 7 | It's a ton of fun being right in the city. There are also many clubs and groups to join. |
| Placement Services | 7 | They are very supportive. Resume review and interview practice are a must. |
| Alumni Network | 8 | We have a very strong career services program. And our alumni are more than happy to help students. |
Boston University Metropolitan College • Boston, MA
Studying MS Computer Science (completion in 1989)
• 7/18/2011
"As a student that was also working full-time, I found the convenience and flexibility of BU to be very helpful to me. I enjoyed the program and found that the credential of the degree helped qualify me for better jobs."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | I think that BU strives to help the working person attain a degree in his/her field. They aim to be flexible and offer conveniently-timed classes. I think that their program was both helpful and practical in its nature and I appreciated that their teachers were active in the fields that they taught. |
| Program Reputation | 5 | I really don't know how good a reputation BU's Met College has for its MS CS program. I chose the program because my company paid for our tuition there and the program seemed pretty good. On the other hand, I don't remember ever hiring anyone that graduated from there. |
| Program Quality | 7 | It gave me credentials for what I was already doing in the field, but didn't really teach me much more. I wish that the program had a track for those of us that were already in the field so that we could skip over the things that are basic to anyone in the field. |
| Instruction | 9 | Boston University provided teachers who were current in their fields. I liked that there was more than just a midterm and final to determine our grade. We had to do either homework, a project, or a paper in addition to those tests. |
| How Difficult | 5 | The course work was mostly not very difficult. (It probably helped that a group of us from work were going through the program together and could help each other out.) The work load would not have been bad if that were all I were doing at the time. Often my company would advise us NOT to take a class if we were working on a particular project that was in crunch mode. |
| Hands-On vs. Bookish | There were courses that were project-oriented (and thus, very hands-on) and those that were more theoretical (and thus, very book oriented). Even the theoretical courses have a practical side, though, and most of our teachers tried to make the connections for us. | |
| Schedule Flexibility | 10 | I took classes at work and at their campus (about half at work and half on campus). I took all of my classes through their evening program, including one during the summer session. In some cases, the classes I took on campus were ones for which there was not enough interest at work to make having a class at our company make sense. While I suppose that there could have been more flexibility on their part, it helped to have classes with people that were not just from my company. |
| Academic Facilities | 7 | The school has excellent resources, however my company has even more advanced computers and there's no wait there. I did not have to use the school's library because my company allowed us to order any necessary books. |
| Social Life | 6 | There were definitely activities for those that were interested. However, there is a big difference between being a full-time student and working while attending school. I wasn't really interested nor did I have the time to participate in social activities at BU. |
| Placement Services | 5 | Its job placement/career services assistance doesn't really apply to me as I was already working when I went through their program. I don't really know anyone that has used their program, so I am not qualified to judge it. |
| Alumni Network | 6 | I think that it's probably quite good, however I was better situated to network with co-workers. Over the past year or so, BU has started offering some interesting programs for alumnae. |
MIT • Cambridge, MA
Studying Computer Science & Engineering (completion in 2013)
• 10/11/2011
"Overall, I'm glad I went to my school. Some of the greatest experiences in my life happened there."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | It is not a place to go to learn a programming language. It is the place to go to learn computer science/engineering. |
| Program Reputation | 10 | Constantly ranked in the top programs in the world. It's a research facility that just happens to teach as well. |
| Program Quality | 9 | Learning from and with some of the smartest people in the world. It is simply amazing to see some of these minds working. |
| Instruction | 7 | Some professors are geared more towards research than teaching. Other times there are foreign instructors that are hard to understand. |
| How Difficult | 10 | There are no easy classes. If you miss a lecture or miss an assignment, you've fallen way behind. |
| Hands-On vs. Bookish | Some classes were more hands-on. You build your circuits, etc. Others were more theoretical and book-oriented. You went to lecture to ask questions, not learn new material. | |
| Schedule Flexibility | 5 | Classes are usually offered Monday-Friday, with no weekends. Summer school was not really an option for undergrads. |
| Academic Facilities | 9 | Libraries were always open. Plenty of computer clusters and meeting spaces. Professors had office hours each week and there were groups dedicated to tutoring in each subject. |
| Social Life | 8 | School was fun socially. It had to be to get through the rigor of 4 years. |
| Placement Services | I have had no experience with any job placement or career services. This does, however, exist. | |
| Alumni Network | 7 | I received my first job through networking from my school. It was a good experience. |
MIT • Cambridge, MA
Studying EECS (completion in 2011)
• 11/19/2011
"MIT was a good fit for me. I'm an aggressive, go-getter and that's exactly what MIT rewards."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | maybe | College search is about finding a good fit. MIT is a good fit for students who are tenacious in their studies. |
| Program Reputation | 10 | It's reputation is known on other continents. It's appearance on a resume often opens more doors than actual experience. |
| Program Quality | 9 | I give a high rating not for the classes, but the college experience. I was around brilliant people, and that created an excellent learning environment. |
| Instruction | 6 | I've really had a wide range of instructors, but they were average. I often found I learned better on my own. |
| How Difficult | 10 | I went to MIT. It's the best technical school. Unsurprisingly, the academics were very challenging. |
| Hands-On vs. Bookish | MIT's biggest failing, I think, is that far too much time is spent on theory and not enough on practice. Even in mechanical engineering classes, I spent 20 minutes with a pencil for every one with a tool. | |
| Schedule Flexibility | 6 | I chose to register for an intense workload. This made my schedule more constrained, but the fact that I could register for twice as much as a standard workload demonstrates how flexible the schedule was. |
| Academic Facilities | 10 | All the technology I needed was there. From high-speed wifi to 3D printers to CDC milling machines to 200-volt power supplies in lab, MIT provided every piece of technology I could need. |
| Social Life | 9 | The social events that appeal to me involve 2-10 people, with nothing extravagant. Where I lived, this was normal. |
| Placement Services | 10 | MIT hosted several career fairs attracting numerous companies in one place. This made my job search mush easier. |
| Alumni Network | I've had no personal experience with MIT's alumni network beyond a few personal friends. |
University Of Lowell (Now UMass Lowell) • Lowell, MA
Studying Computer Science (completion in 1988)
• 12/18/2011
"The professors really cared about us. In addition, they were determined to make sure that we knew our craft well enough to get paid for it."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | I cannot emphasize enough the need for programmers to program in order to make money. I cannot emphasize enough the need for them to DESIGN things in advance and learn that skill. There is only one way to do that, and that is to engage in design work almost every day for 3-4 years. I learned that skill at my school. |
| Program Reputation | 10 | Before UMass swallowed ULowell, we had an excellent reputation. We were known as 'coders,' meaning we could sit down on any machine and build code way, way faster than the industry standard, 100 lines of fully debugged code per month, in use at the time. |
| Program Quality | 9 | As a student, I got to work on VAX 11/780's, Apollo Workstations, and Sun Workstations, and I got to program in environments which were the foundation of our development environments today. I held in my hands one of the very first laptop computers, the Data General DG-1. |
| Instruction | 10 | My professors were mad men and women, but at the same time, with them pushing us, we learned and were forced to be very good. One class I had covered 21 programming languages in 15 weeks (Principals of Programming Languages). |
| How Difficult | 10 | Our professors would adjust the class to max out the challenge for us. They were not afraid to give us problems that they were not sure our mainframe/mini computers could solve; they let us chew on them and report back if it could be done or not. |
| Hands-On vs. Bookish | We were given machines and assignments, and told to make it work. | |
| Schedule Flexibility | 5 | During the time I went, we used punched cards to walk around a giant hall and register for courses. |
| Academic Facilities | 10 | Along with the common engineering work stations, Apollos and the like, we had Stellar's, Ardents, Stardents, Apollo Prism Workstations, and Dec Alphas. |
| Social Life | 1 | As computer programmers, we were not very socially involved. We did do things like see who could go the longest without sleep and still code. |
| Placement Services | I never used them, so I really can't comment. | |
| Alumni Network | 5 | I know very little about our network. They send me stuff all the time, though. |
Olin College Of Engineering • Needham, MA
Studying Electrical And Computer Engineering (completion in 2010)
• 12/30/2011
"I feel that I got a great understanding of technology in general from my tenure at Olin. However, I wish that the experience hadn't quite been so insular."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | maybe | A recommendation would depend... if you want to go do graduate work in a specialized field, go to a big college - with grad students and more faculty/program diversity. If you don't know what you want to do, other than that you want to be an engineer, go to Olin, as you'll receive a well-rounded education. |
| Program Reputation | 7 | I believe Olin has a good reputation amongst other colleges and big industry - and for a good reason given the quality of students and faculty. However, since Olin is a new school, many smaller employers have never heard of it. |
| Program Quality | 9 | I got an excellent education in electrical and computer engineering. The students were fantastic, the instructors were knowledgeable. The school had a great set of stockrooms full of components such as integrated circuits, capacitors, various interconnects, breadboards, etc. |
| Instruction | 9 | The faculty are amazing, with a couple of exceptions. I also was instructed to a large extent by my very knowledgeable peers (I learned most of my Linux knowledge from a few friends back in college). |
| How Difficult | 9 | The work load was very heavy during some years. Many people at Olin work constantly. Most people will have to decide between getting A's, having a social life, or your mental and physical health. |
| Hands-On vs. Bookish | Olin is an experiment in hands-on project based learning. However, some of the project-based learning ended up being a bit unnecessary | |
| Schedule Flexibility | 2 | As a small school, Olin does not provide much flexibility. This was in large part because of the number of professors relative to the diversity of courses they attempted to offer. |
| Academic Facilities | 9 | As I mentioned above, Olin has a great ECE stockroom. They also have a fantastic library with a great selection, even though it is small. Students can recommend books they'd like be added to the library collection. |
| Social Life | 5 | I wish that Olin were in a city. It was known as 'the egg' when I was at college. The social groups are very insular. However, they are also tight knit and supportive towards social misfits like myself. |
| Placement Services | 7 | I've heard that Olin has good job placement services, but I never used them. However, I did get my current job through someone I met though the senior capstone program - so I guess that's evidence of success. |
| Alumni Network | 5 | I feel alienated from the current alumni system. This is, however, entirely my fault, not the schools. |
Worcester Polytechnic Institute • Worcester, MA
Studying Computer Science (completion in 2011)
• 3/19/2012
"While I am satisfied, I do not give it higher marks due to the overall cost of the program for the value of the education received. If the cost was less or if they were more willing to give out financial aid, then it would have received higher marks."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | maybe | While it is a good school, there are items to watch out for in terms of the cost. If a comparable school can be found that is significantly less costly, I would recommend going there instead. |
| Program Reputation | 7 | While WPI does have a great computer science program, there are other programs in the area (UMASS) who have comparable if not better degrees for less cost. |
| Program Quality | 8 | Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) has a great computer science department that caters to the needs of their students. Their project based curriculum allows for students to excel in their respective fields by giving them real world problems and challenges. |
| Instruction | 8 | Again, WPI's project based courses allow for accelerated learning and preparation for the real world. In terms of career preparation working in team environments at an early stage was vital to later success. |
| How Difficult | 6 | While the program was difficult, other programs on campus were deemed more challenging, such as the mechanical and electrical engineering degree programs. |
| Hands-On vs. Bookish | Being that it was a project based course structure, the system was very hands on. The motto was theory and practice. | |
| Schedule Flexibility | 3 | Due to the accelerated coursework, flexibility in terms of the time of day in which classes are taken is quite minimal. Most classes are offered between 8am and 5pm. |
| Academic Facilities | 6 | Being in the computer science department, the best equipment was available to us to use. New computers were issued once every 3 years with tablets for graphic design. |
| Social Life | 1 | Being mainly an engineering school, there was little to no social interaction. School run or sponsored events appeared to be relatively infrequent during my freshman and sophomore years. |
| Placement Services | 10 | The career development center (CDC) is constantly helping students locate jobs through the jobfinder and career fairs held twice a year. Upon graduation, they will continue to help and assist in locating a job. |
| Alumni Network | 8 | Regional alumni groups allow for constant contact with the university. Within my workplace, there are several alumni who all work together. |
UMass Lowell • Lowell, MA
Studying Electrical Engineering (completion in 2008)
• 3/12/2012
"It is a state school, and the profs were old and antiquated. But, the school doesn't make the student. The student makes it or breaks it for himself"
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | They offer everything any other school would. |
| Program Reputation | Not sure how it ranks. | |
| Program Quality | 9 | People were highly sought after for coding skills. |
| Instruction | 8 | Newbies need not apply - you had to come to the table with some kind of coding background. The basics lecture lasted all of five minutes. |
| How Difficult | 8 | The CS classes were not bad, it's just adding a full course load that made things edgy. |
| Hands-On vs. Bookish | A good mix, labs were frequent, and they did cover lecture and book material. | |
| Schedule Flexibility | 4 | Core courses were only during the day, and were not offered every semester. |
| Academic Facilities | 5 | Not much went into modernization, until after I was gone. I know what burnt in screens look like. |
| Social Life | 5 | I didn't participate. I stayed nerdy. |
| Placement Services | 6 | Job boards were posted in the common areas, some profs were into research projects that could land you an in with the client company. |
| Alumni Network | 7 | In New England, getting an engineering position is rather easy. |
Boston University • Boston, MA
Studying Computer Science (completion in 1980)
• 3/8/2012
"I was very satisfied. I got a great education, which served me well."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | I received job offers before graduating. My academic credentials were well respected. |
| Program Reputation | 10 | My academic credentials were well received by potential employers. I received several job offers, even before graduation. |
| Program Quality | 10 | Excellent instructors and a large amount of computers. The labs are excellent. The education was very relevant to my future job. |
| Instruction | 10 | Excellent instructors. Classes were interesting and I used much of what I learned on the job. The information was hands on and not just abstract. |
| How Difficult | 8 | It was challenging, but doable. I felt it was just the right balance. |
| Hands-On vs. Bookish | I had a lot of hands-on experience. I was well prepared for the real world when I graduated. | |
| Schedule Flexibility | 9 | I never had problems meeting my preferences for no early morning classes. The variety of options was excellent. I was also able to take summer classes. |
| Academic Facilities | 9 | Libraries, facilities, computers - everything was excellent. I felt well taken care of. |
| Social Life | 9 | There was a nice amount of events and sports activities. There is definitely a spirit and sense of community. |
| Placement Services | 9 | Recruiters came to the campus and then invited me back to headquarters. It was well organized. |
| Alumni Network | 9 | A vast network of alumni. I continue to receive updates and invites to events. |
Boston University • Boston, MA
Studying Computer Science (completion in 1980)
• 3/28/2012
"I am very satisfied with the education and the start it gave me. I could not have asked for more. I had a very solid base when I started working."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | I recommend it without reservations. Excellent school with a great reputation. |
| Program Reputation | 9 | My educational credentials were well respected. My company goes on recruiting trips to Boston University, and that means graduates have proven themselves to be knowledgeable and productive. |
| Program Quality | 10 | I received very relevant education. I could start working right away and be productive. My educational credentials were well respected. |
| Instruction | 10 | The instruction was very good. Practical instruction, which served me well from day one to today. |
| How Difficult | 8 | It was a challenging program, but totally achievable with hard work. I enjoyed my classes and labs. |
| Hands-On vs. Bookish | It was a good mix of study and lab. I found it to be a very good balance. And there was certainly an opportunity to spend more time in the lab - I did a lot of projects on my own because it was fun for me. | |
| Schedule Flexibility | 10 | Very flexible as I managed to avoid early morning classes and still get all the courses I was interested in. There are also evening programs for those who want to go to school while working. |
| Academic Facilities | 10 | Computer labs were excellent. The library had plenty of resources. The tutors and lab assistants were knowledgeable. |
| Social Life | 9 | I was not big into parties, but that was my choice. There were certainly plenty of activities going on, including athletics and social events. |
| Placement Services | 10 | I got my job several months prior to graduating because Boston University hosted an on campus job fair. As I mentioned earlier, my current employer still participates in those on-campus fairs. It certainly made things easier for me. |
| Alumni Network | 10 | There are a lot of alumni programs and events. I still get invitations, magazines, and even phone calls. |
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