From being a user experience designer to identifying and fixing security weak points in crucial infrastructure, computer science offers a huge variety of potential career trajectories for students to consider when figuring out what they want to major in as a college student. Because it’s such a diverse field, paired with high starting salaries, computer science has become one of the most popular majors for top students around the world.
The popularity of computer science has also made it one of the most competitive majors to get into in the United States, especially at the most competitive schools. Most of the top-tier computer science schools have super low acceptance rates. This means that you need to get a leg up on the competition if you want to get into a highly-respected program — and you need to do it now.
We usually talk to students about their future goals in their sophomore year of high school, but don’t worry if you’re already in 11th grade. There’s still time to plan for college as a junior. In fact, we consider junior year to be the last big opportunity to make major improvements to your portfolio, resume, and transcript before sending out applications. So, in this post we’ll outline how to really impress admissions counselors and what you can do now to stand apart from the competition as a prospective computer science major.
Discovering Your Niche
When working with students, we put a lot of focus at the start on identifying what their “niche” is. Some people refer to this as a student’s ‘brand’ but regardless of the term you use, it really just means identifying what your individual skills and interests are, how those skills and interests can be crafted into a compelling narrative for your application, and what about those skills and interests you want to focus in on in college. Pinpointing your passions and crafting a vision for your future, along with really knowing what you want to do in college, is critical during the prep and application process. Now, let’s be clear. We know that you are very likely to shift your focus once you are in college. You may stay within the major but discover a new route, or you may completely switch majors, moving from one field to an entirely different one. This is totally normal as you grow and explore. However, it’s super important that your application be focused, so for the purpose of your college applications, we strongly recommend speaking with confidence about your prospective path.
As we help students figure out what they want their niche to be, one of the key steps is zooming in. For computer science, it might be that a student wants to work in the video game industry. So, we would start with the general concept of video game development and then narrow it down from there in a process that we call “funneling.” Maybe you’re interested in programming games, so we would get you started on learning Unity or Unreal Engine. Assuming you settled on Unreal, we would then help you find resources for learning more about the engine and how to use it to its full potential. We’d help you find an internship with a video game company that uses the same tools you’re learning, and we’d seek out a mentorship opportunity with a successful programmer who can help you envision your potential future in the field. See? We’ve funneled it down to a super specific topic, and identified routes on how to get there!
Finding Resources
To learn more about your niche, you’re going to have to do some homework. We know, ugh. But it’s actually going to be super fun and interesting, we promise.
In the computer science world, this might involve a lot of online learning and practicing coding languages, and that hands-on experience is key to becoming an expert. You really want to be the best at your niche that you can be to impress admissions counselors at those big name schools that you want to go to, so take any course you can at your school that is relevant, and it’s worth identifying online or local college courses to fill gaps in what your school can offer.
The good news is that studying your niche should be more interesting than your usual schoolwork. Because you’re learning about topics that are interesting to you, it shouldn’t be painful to dedicate time to. And if you really aren’t jiving with what you’re studying, you might want to consider adjusting your niche to something that you would enjoy more (it may even be what you find yourself wishing you were working on when doing your assigned work). When we work with students, we make a customized curriculum including courses, programs, online resources, and more to help them learn about their interests, funneling it down into a workable niche, so they can learn more about their focus as they go.
Taking Advantage of Extracurriculars
Knowledge might be power, but experience is just as important when you’re looking to get into a top-tier college. We want our students to gain experience and skills related to their niche to help them launch a successful future, and colleges really want to see pursuits that go above and beyond to explore your niche when they read your application. Specifically, we get our students to explore their interests outside of the classroom. In a school setting, this might take the form of offering tutoring for students in computer classes at your school, or even for adult learners at a local library, or joining a computer science-related club — anything that’s related to your niche.
A big portion of your extracurriculars will probably be outside of school and will require creativity to identify, like using online tools to practice and learn new coding languages, experimenting with making your own programs and websites with online resources, or even volunteering at a nonprofit that brings coding lessons and resources into under-resourced schools. When students work with us, we help them hone their interests on a higher level. Our students build apps and websites, find software solutions to problems, and work in labs with professors.
While we won’t force students away from passions that aren’t directly in their niche, including clubs, sports, music, or theater, we do recommend that they don’t overcommit to extracurriculars that aren’t related to their niche. Enjoying yourself and continuing with passions you excel in, even if they aren’t your niche, is great. However, extracurriculars that are not related to your niche are not going to be as helpful to your college application as those that are, unless you truly excel at them — like being an award-winning musician or leader on an athletic team.
Making The Most Of Summer
While we don’t want to take away our students’ only long-term break from school for the year, two months of uninterrupted time away from classes can be really useful for exploring niches while also being a fun time. To make the best use of their time, we work with our students to help them get some experience and possibly college credit during their summer breaks — while still leaving time for a family vacation.
Summer programs at local universities that are specifically geared towards high-performing high schoolers are really popular for students looking to get some experience in their niches and learn more about them in a collegiate-style setting. We love these programs when they are a strong fit for a student’s niche, but any way for them to build their skills and learn more about what they like is good, whether it takes the form of attending a college-style program, taking online classes, or going to a specialized summer camp for their niche.
If you’ve already been to summer programs and want to deepen your knowledge base, getting a job, doing some research, working on a project with a college professor, or landing an internship are all good ideas. In fact, we encourage all of our students to have at least one paying summer job during high school. Double points (there aren’t actually points, don’t worry) if the job can intersect with your area of interest.
To an admissions counselor, utilizing your summers shows that you’re committed to not just your field — but your future.
Applications
For our juniors, we begin working on the main Common App essay around June or July, depending on their summer schedule. After that’s fully drafted, we work on Early Decision and Early Action application supplements well in advance of the deadlines. Ideally, all of the supplements — yes, all of them — are drafted, if not finalized, by the start of senior year. We do this in the summer so that it frees up time for all of the craziness that senior year can have, and have found that getting work done early sets students up for a successful senior year.
Junior year is really, really busy, but it’s also your last opportunity to make substantial progress on your niche before you have to start sending out college applications. So, make sure you use this year to set yourself up for success!
Getting ready for college can be tough. Need some help? Let us know. We’re great at getting students into their dream colleges.