Oregon State Post-bacc CS degree

6,312 Views | 46 Replies | Last: 3 yr ago by RockOn
RockOn
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Summary: I started at A&M years ago in Computer Science but was too immature at 18 to get it done. I began coding in middle School and it has always been a passion. I did well in the CS classes, just not the physics/calc,etc.
Switched to economics (reeled off 4.0s from then on) and have enjoyed a successful early career in banking. But I know a career in software is where I'm supposed to be. So I've applied for the Oregon State online program. 60 credit hour bachelor's degree. I will continue to work full time but I don't have a family and my life is pretty streamlined. I know I have the time management and desire to get it done.

Anybody done something like this? Any feedback, tips, help? Regrets?
Quad Dog
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AG
So what's the plan after you get the degree? Will you get a new job that somehow combines economics and CS?
Do you want to get a second job coding and keep your current one?
Not trying to dissuade you, but you don't need a CS degree if you will be coding as a hobby or even as a second part time job.
RockOn
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Career change. I suppose a my banking background could be appealing to certain fintech companies, but combining the two is not the goal.

I will leave my job when the time comes.
RockOn
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Applied and got in.
Gooder Poster
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AG
Is this basically a start from scratch program or do you need previous knowledge and experience to do it?

Also any idea on cost?
RockOn
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$497 / hr * 60 credits is 29,820.

You can certainly start from scratch, but it seems from the subreddit people are applying with at least some CS related skill. People have been taking free online courses thorough edx or udemy to at least get started.

Starting next term, there is a calculus prerequisite plus communication and English, but all that was covered by my economics degree
OCEN99
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AG
I'm graduating from the program in December with my only experience going in being writing the occasional Excel macro. I did it for pretty much the same reasons following getting laid off back in '16.

OP make sure you get hooked up with the student Slack. It's a great resource to lean on when you're stuck on assignments.
RockOn
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That's great OCEN! Are you A&M class of 99? How's the job market looking for you coming out of the program?
OCEN99
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AG
RockOn said:

That's great OCEN! Are you A&M class of 99? How's the job market looking for you coming out of the program?
I am indeed, and believe it or not there are people older than me enrolled in the program.

From what I've seen so far, there's a strong demand for developers right now, particularly in Austin and DFW. I want to stay in Houston though, so that 's where I've focused my searching. Looks like .NET is the most in-demand stack here.
ORAggieFan
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Don't expect to see my alma mater popping up on The Nerdery.

If you want to really advance your career, once you have the degree, go learn Salesforce! I can't hire fast enough and have HQ in Austin.
OCEN99
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AG
I can believe that about Salesforce. There's another student who works with them who's constantly linking openings on Slack.
DevilYack
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AG
I just left my job at Oregon State to come home to Texas. Let me know if you need any connections up there and I can hook you up.
RockOn
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Will certainly take the suggestion to heart. Any chance of internships or Jr level openings when I progress through 50-75% of the program?
ORAggieFan
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RockOn said:

Will certainly take the suggestion to heart. Any chance of internships or Jr level openings when I progress through 50-75% of the program?

Yeah, I'd be open to talking. All depends on needs at the time.
flakrat
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AG
What kind of SalesForce hiring do you do?
ORAggieFan
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Mainly consultants, solution architects, technical architects and PMs in the US.
flakrat
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AG
Wish we'd have gone with Sales Force for our helpdesk and project management. Instead we picked Service Now, which is clunky as heck.
ORAggieFan
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flakrat said:

Wish we'd have gone with Sales Force for our helpdesk and project management. Instead we picked Service Now, which is clunky as heck.

I had an offer to be employee 400 at ServiceNow. Worked out well I didn't take it, but was tough seeing their stock over the years.
RockOn
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Registered for classes tonight. Starting out with 161 and 225 (while also working full time, but no family commitments)
OCEN99
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AG
161 isn't too tough if you've got any sort of previous programming experience. 225 will depend on your math background since there's a lot of writing proofs, but there are a lot of resources available (Slack, class discussion boards, peer tutors, etc.) to help if you get stuck with something.

Since class starts tomorrow, let me wish you good luck. I've got cloud development and the capstone project this term, and after that I'll be all done.
YankeeAg05
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Might consider Georgia Tech OMSCS program for others considering distance programs. Receive the same degree as on campus masters kids for about $800/course. The course work is excellent and professors are typically very helpful. they do allow career changers into the program but you have to be able to show you're up for the assignments with some programming experience. I've really enjoyed the coursework especially some of the more challenging classes. I'm in my 8th semester and have gotten to work on some really cool stuff. Last semester in reinforcement learning we built a deep q network agent to train a 2d lunar lander simulation to land itself which was exhausting and thrilling.
hassan10s
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AG
Starting the Georgia Tech program this spring. Pretty excited
YankeeAg05
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Congrats hassan10s! If you haven't already found them there are pretty big communities on slack and google plus for omscs. Lots of good advice and discussion on courses.
RockOn
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Quote:

OP make sure you get hooked up with the student Slack. It's a great resource to lean on when you're stuck on assignments.

This turned out to be very true! Love the Slack community. We had someone join the OSU Slack DFW channel and say that he completed the program and never even knew slack existed. How lonely that must have been!

I finished my first term last week, A's in both 161/225 but definitely earned them. 162 solo is up next.

In the month we have before next term I'm working through The Linux Programming Interface book, doing some data structures in C, and learning to create makefiles.
OCEN99
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AG
RockOn said:

Quote:

OP make sure you get hooked up with the student Slack. It's a great resource to lean on when you're stuck on assignments.

This turned out to be very true! Love the Slack community. We had someone join the OSU Slack DFW channel and say that he completed the program and never even knew slack existed. How lonely that must have been!

I finished my first term last week, A's in both 161/225 but definitely earned them. 162 solo is up next.

In the month we have before next term I'm working through The Linux Programming Interface book, doing some data structures in C, and learning to create makefiles.
162 solo is a good idea since the workload is definitely a step up from the first classes. You probably want to make sure you're comfortable with pointers and maybe dynamic arrays before going in. You'll be writing a lot of makefiles in there to, so that will be good to prep for as well.
RockOn
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I spent the break going through Suraj Sharmas YouTube tutorials on c++. Very much helpful on like you said. Pointers , dynamic arrays, stringstream input validation, makefiles, vectors, etc.

Even with all that I'm glad I'm taking this class solo bc the workload is a lot. I get home everyday at 6pm and just code for a couple of hours every night. It's fun, definitely enjoying it though.

Next term I'll go back to 2 classes. Web Dev and Data Structures.
RockOn
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Keep us informed how it goes! I might be interested in it in the future. Also saw UT Austin has an online master's CS degree now.
RockOn
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I'm finding 162 to be far less difficult and time consuming as I was led to believe or the term is front loaded on work. Suppose that's okay. Whenever I don't have an assignment to work on I'm getting better with Java and C.

Next term I will take 290 web dev and 271 architecture/ assembly. I'll do 2 classes per term going forward. Data structures and databases in the summer then algos and SE1 in the fall.
rbcs_2
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AG
Reading through this thread makes me miss college. I haven't thought about some of these classes in years.
rynning
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AG
RockOn said:

Career change. I suppose a my banking background could be appealing to certain fintech companies, but combining the two is not the goal.


Why not? FinTech is huge and innovative, and you'd have the perfect skill set.
RockOn
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Not opposed to it, just want to be open to many possibilities.
OCEN99
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AG
Update: I finished the program back at the end of last month, and today I accepted an offer for my first software engineering position.
RockOn
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Just saw this OCEN congrats!
JDCAG (NOT Colin)
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AG
Congrats!!
RockOn
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Another term completed! Web Development (Node/MySQL/Frontend) and Computer Architecture/Assembly.

Just keep rockin forward while still working full-time in old career. This summer started in 2 weeks and I'll take Data Structures in C and Databases.

I'll probably start looking for dev jobs/internships after the summer if anyone knows of anything.
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