I just graduated from the OMSCS (online master of science in computer science) program, and I found it a wholly worthwhile experience. It was challenging, informative, and for the most part well-run. Software Analysis and Test in particular was a real eye-opener. And while Computability, Complexity, and Algorithms was a hideous death march of terror, the material they covered was some of the most interesting I've ever experienced.
Yes, you can study the same material on your own, but you won't earn a degree from it. Now that I've got the degree, I'm in much better shape to pursue further learning on my own.
Note, however, that I didn't do this to improve my resume, go fishing for a new job, or try to get a raise. With tuition reimbursement from my company I only spent $3500 over 2 1/2 years to earn a full-fledged master's degree.
Based on the above, I can't agree that it's a losing proposition.
"Now that I've got the degree, I'm in much better shape to pursue further learning on my own."
Could you explain a bit more what do you mean with this statement? Is it that you feel better prepared to study advanced topics (like advanced ML/Data Science) or was the degree a requirement for something else you wanted to pursue?
I'm curious about what other "doors" having this degree opens, other than the bump in salary mentioned by others.
I was exposed to new sources of information throughout the program, such as Youtube videos, books, and lots of papers on computer science topics. Being required to read all that upped my ability to absorb and comprehend them. So now I feel I can go back to, say, my algorithms books and do a much deeper dive into topics not covered in depth. Or go follow up with some of the tools, like Korat or Dafny, and learn more about their internals and applications.
I honestly don't expect it to open any additional doors for me. I'm a software developer with 30 years experience and have been working for the same company for nearly 18 years. I wasn't looking for any changes, I just wanted to be better at what I did.
Thanks for the congratulations. It was quite difficult at times, took a lot of effort, but was totally worth it, IMHO.
I'm not the author of the above comment, but here is my take..
I think one benefit of a curated course is that it includes materials you didn't even know exists. We can easily improve on our known unknowns - just pick up a book or google it - but unknowns unknowns are... well difficult to learn. I think going through a graduate program helps you get a better grasp of what you don't know AND what you didn't know you didn't know.
Yes, that's certainly an aspect of it. As someone with a lot of professional experience, it's easy to get into a rut with what you're required to do in your day job. I always tried to keep up with new techniques, frameworks, etc. But getting the degree forced me to learn more about the course subjects. Like in Computer Networking, most of my low-level networking knowledge was several years old. Being exposed to Software Defined Networking was very interesting, and I enjoyed experimenting with Pyretic to explore how it works.
In my experience having a well structured program with good content is more important than it being an in person program. This is especially true if there are ways to reach out to live help when a student is struggling with some aspect of the program.
Absolutely. One of the key pillars in the program is student-to-student interaction, either via the Piazza course communication system, or direct contact.
I have extensive knowledge of VMs, so I helped many students get their environments set up. I could often diagnose show-stopping problems for the less-experienced students very quickly, since at my experience level I really have "seen it all". And if it wasn't something I could diagnose that way, I'd set up a Google Hangouts call and watch exactly what was happening on their screen and get them through it.
Many other students did the same thing. In Computability, Complexity, and Algorithms, there were some students who were apparently math robots from the future, solving the problem sets effortlessly, and posting them to Piazza so that the rest of us could use their work for study purposes.
Not OP, but I'm applying to some graduate programs this year that lead to a Ph.D. in CS, and some institutes have a hard requirement of a Masters degree for getting into their Ph.D. programs, while some (like most top US universities, including GATech) allow you to enroll with a Bachelor's Degree, provided you'll do the required coursework before the dissertation phase. It's really cool that one can earn a Master's Degree while working full-time, before applying to a Ph.D. program :)
Yes, I worked full-time. I'm fortunate in that I WFH, so I could allocate the time I'd have had to commute to school, figure 90 minutes a day. I'm married but have no children, so I didn't have that requiring my attention. Then I'd augment with whatever additional time was needed (at the expense of World of Warcraft).
I'd figure for a "light" class that had a fair amount of coding or was in a subject area that I had considerable experience would be 10-15 hours a week.
A semester with 2 classes of moderate difficulty would be 20-30 hours a week, depending on homework pacing, amount of videos and readings to study, etc.
The hardest class I took was my last class in December called Computability, Complexity, and Algorithms (CCA) and at the end I was doing 35+ hours a week trying to get ahead. It was hugely difficult due to my very weak math background, but I somehow got the hang of it and passed with a decent "B" and graduated.
Yes, you can study the same material on your own, but you won't earn a degree from it. Now that I've got the degree, I'm in much better shape to pursue further learning on my own.
Note, however, that I didn't do this to improve my resume, go fishing for a new job, or try to get a raise. With tuition reimbursement from my company I only spent $3500 over 2 1/2 years to earn a full-fledged master's degree.
Based on the above, I can't agree that it's a losing proposition.