Some Excelsior CIS Requirements met with GRE Subject Exam for Computer Science

Below is some great info from the archive (Google cache of degreeinfo.com). It is from a post by PatrickG in February 2001:

On Friday, I e-mailed Excelsior College a question about this same issue and will post their response when I receive it. My guess is that Excelsior's policy has not changed regarding which course requirements will be fulfilled by the GRE Subject test for Computer Science.

 

Also, assuming the above info is still true, the only CIS requirements remaining are:

- Systems Analysis & Design
- Database Concepts
- 15 elective CIS credits (since Excelsior requires 45 CIS credits to graduate and gives up to 30 credits for the GRE Subject exam)
- Calculus I or Discrete Math

 

The CS GRE is not a walk in the park.
They have a practice test somewhere on their web page. Check it out.

Brandon

 

Yes, I would have to start studying now for the April 2006 exam.

 

Also, if I decide to go to grad school, the main advantage of the GRE Subject exam would be simply fulfilling CIS elective credits since I would want to show grades for course requirements like Data Structures.

For me, a more important advantage is that the grad school I like for computer science, the University of Florida, recommends taking the Subject Exam since it would be taken into account when applying.

 

I was in the same boat as you. I went for an Excelsior BSCIS since it was cheap and relatively fast (compared to the undergrad DL CS optiokns), but I knew from the start that I wanted to get into a good CS grad program. As a result, I decided early to try and take certain, specific classes (data structures, discrete math). On top of that, I took the CS GRE to demonstrate a broader knowledge of CS that my CIS "coursework " (mainly ICCP exams) doesn't really show. I did not actually use the CS GRE for any credit at Excelsior, since I already had my CIS credits taken care of when I took the test.

The CS GRE was the hardest single test I have ever taken. To prepare, I read an operating systems book, a networking book, a database book, an algorithms book, and a discrete math review. I still came out of the test feeling completely battered. But it got me into UIUC, so it worked out as planned in the end.

 

Thanks, Jeff. This really brings it home to me that I will need to start studying for the exam today.

 

Below is the detailed info I received today from an academic advisor at Excelsior College:

 

Interesting that they are basing credit on the score, rather than percentile. I need to dig up my scores to see how realistic those targets are.

 

According to Interpreting Your GRE Scores (PDF file), the GRE score, unlike the percentile rank, shows the same level of ability through the years:

The same report also states that the average score was 715 for the GRE for Computer Science. This is based on all exams taken between 7/1/2001 to 6/30/2004. (BTW, a total of 10, 130 people took the exam between that time.)

A former student from Excelsior College, Hunter Hogan, took the exam in 2003 and reports about his score in his very good study guide:

 

I forgot that they scaled the score.

The study guide isn't half bad, though it won't help much on many of the quantitative questions. It reminded me that I left two books off of my study list - an architecture book and an automata theory book (or a good compiler book that covers this well).

 

Yeah, now that I have taken another look at the practice exam, that study guide, like other study guides for this exam, is quite limited.

For now, I am studying by reading my textbooks and using the MIT OpenCourseWare for computer science. After I finish auditing a few of the MIT courses, I will take the GRE CS practice test.

 

If anyone else besides me is planning on taking the GRE for Computer Science, the best study guide from the Net seems to be the booklet called Preparing for Graduate School Examinations in Computer Science by Christopher Scaffidi, a graduate student at Carnegie Mellon. The booklet is 115 pages and is distributed as shareware: