What Students Say
Likes
- I applied to this university in the last moment. My application cannot be generalized to take as a reference. It is always better to start early. After 3 years of working I definitely felt a need to get into academia again and take a switch from my SDE job in India.
- Acads are well structured. UTD MS CS offers various degree tracks. We can choose one among them to plan our course work that aligns with our interests. The computer science program is rated highly for its flexibility, quality of course structure, network and research output. One of the best computer science programs in United States.
Dislikes
- While the program is solid, there's a high degree of variance in quality of professors. For the same course ,it is possible that two different instructors teach it at different levels. While it might be easy to get a good grade by choosing the instructor with lighter academic load , it leads to diluted learning and you will not be getting the best of what they offer. Also relatively high fees is one of major drawbacks. Often students find it difficult to fund their tution and apply for transfers.
Required Exams for Admission
Academically good. There are few other colleges that are similar in acads but much better fee structure . ( For ex ASU). Overall it's decent. If you are coming from a top tier engineering college in India, you might feel the acads here are bit diluted and easy but the opportunities after MS are worth taking the risk.
Course Curriculum
Very relevant. Due to its flexibility, we can choose what interests us. Most students choose Data Science track by default as it is relatively easy to do. I chose computer systems track. It is due to my interest and has a promising place next 10 years.
Faculty
There are some really good professors as per the students who took their classes in their tracks. We usually have 3 courses per semester. So far I completed 6 courses. From my experience, Prof. Neeraj Mittal for Distributed computing is really good. Most of the professors are very approachable. I won't say any of them left an incredible impact on me, but what they teach is good enough for students looking to learn something purely out of curiosity than completing a degree. Now coming to how I rate them compared to faculty in my Undergrad at IIT KGP. I feel the professors there were much more knowledged and deep into the subject and research than here in UTD. But all of this matters only when we are interested in a research career. ( Eg: PhD , Masters with Thesis). Overall , faculty is good.
Campus Life
Campus is beautiful. We have a very good library. Most of the times , some or the other events happen across the campus. For sports , there are swimming pools, courts for basketball, table tennis , squash etc . There is a well equipped gym as well. Coming to clubs, I didn't see research/tech clubs much in MS student community. Mostly they are active in Undergrad. This is slightly disappointing. Also it should be noted that , for a two year study involving in clubs also comes at a cost of time. We usually get busy with finding an internship by end of first year and a full-time by second year. But for someone who is looking into getting a research career later , having a good communication with professors working in the same area will surely help.
Placement
Usually pay scale depends on the place of working. Since the current economic situation is not so good for IT, nothing can be generalized based on 2023/24 placements. Almost all colleges will have same pay scale. But , better colleges will have better alumni network, so easier to get an interview. Once you get an interview, it's all about how well you prove yourself to the employer. People with good contacts can get referrals easy.
Accommodation
Almost all the accommodation facilities meet the same needs. Only thing student should take into account is safety. Gated communities should be preferred. Communities near grocery stores ( Walmart/ Tom thumb) should be preferred. We have two bus routes to reach the campus that run in a loop. West side has bus frequency of 15 mins , East side has bus frequency of 30 mins. Accommodation rents change as per the demand and are usually high during Fall / Spring intake times and stay constant until the lease ends.
Exams
My scores : GRE (316 - 170 Qt + 146 Verbal) , TOEFL -105 , I don't remember my AWA. There are people I know who scored around GRE 310±5 and got at admitted. And 95 in TOEFL. But it's always recommend to have 315+ and 100+ to be on safer side. I sent 1 page 1 paragraph SOP( normally 2 pages is recommended, I chose to keep it as simple as possible) I got my one of my LORs from my B.tech thesis advisor (one of the renowned scientists in AI with very high H- index), 1 from my manager(associate director, 1 from technical lead) Also sent a resume. Important things to note: My LORs are from people I closely worked with and I had a proven record during my collaboration. My SOP answers only why I'm applying for Masters in computer science, and how it helps in advancing my career. It doesn't repeat much from CV. My LORs candidly talk about what I have accomplished and how MS helps me in shaping my career. No interviews. Purely based on the material submitted during the application.
Fees
1 course - 3 credits 12 courses(min) to complete the degree requirement. Each course enrollment costs $5500( this might slightly increase in future depending on the time of enrollment) Minimum of 2 courses should be enrolled in each semester. Maximum of 6 can be enrolled ( but academic advisors usually allow 3 or max 4). 1500$ health insurance is mandatory ( per semester) So total of 17000$ per semester ( 3 courses + health insurance) Most students choose off campus housing. Per month expenses (including Water/Electricity/WiFi etc) comes around 550$ ±50 We have a bus facility to reach the campus and comeback ( at 15 mins & 30 mins frequency free) for most off campus housings. Groceries per month costs around 100$ . So assume a minimum monthly expenses of 700$.
Scholarship
For some unfortunate reasons international students getting a scholarship for MS in CS at Eric Johnson school is really difficult. Almost impossible. I only knew one student who got scholarship from UTD CS. It not due to incompetency, it is just that the school is not very interested in offering scholarships.
