Georgia Tech OMSCS Review: Should you do it?

Yes, maybe, and no

All done

Update (2019/06/11): I’m offering tutoring for OMSCS courses. Feel free to reach me through my request for tutoring form and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible!

Introduction

I normally talk about very technical subjects, but given that I finished Georgia Tech’s OMSCS program last week, I thought it would be the correct time to write a piece on whether or not I’ve found the program to be useful to help prospective students make the right decision whether or not to entire the program as it is a very long time commitment in order to complete the program. The short answer is that it is worth it. The long answer is it’s only worth it to those who have certain goals of what they might receive from the program. Now to help those who are unsure if they have the right goals of what they might get out of the program, I’ll discuss what I’ve seen to be the right and wrong reasons for doing the entire program.

Wrong Reason: For a 10k pay bump

This is the absolute worse reason to the program. While it’s documented there is a pay bump in doing a MS in CS, the time commitment required for the program, which on average is 3 years for 10 hours a week, costs much more than the 10k a year you might get in a pay bump from getting an advanced degree. In the technical field, it is much more profitable to switch employers to get a 10k pay bump which takes a lot less time than completing this degree. So please, do not do the program for the pay bump you might get from completing this degree.

Wrong Reason: I have nothing to lose if doing program, my employer is covering it!

While yes it might be valid you might be able to have any of the costs associated in doing OMSCS covered by your employer or through government financial aid, you forget about all of the opportunities you might have to miss out on because of your commitment to the program. There are hard due dates and deadlines which must be followed which means potentially missing on advancing your career at your current company as you cannot put in as much time and effort as when you were not doing OMSCS. In addition, OMSCS does tend to make people…