What Students Say
Likes
- The campus is really beautiful and has diverse student population. Hence, there are many student organisations for everyone's interest
- The McKeldin library is one of my favourite places in campus. It is a huge library and literally has all the resources you need.
- The location of UMD is very close to Washington DC ( about 30 minutes by metro ).
Dislikes
- The campus is not surrounded with much shops. There are only two grocery shops around campus Lidl and Trader Joes at walking distance.
- There is always some construction work going on in campus and most of the roads are blocked throughout the year.
- As an international grad student, it is not easy to find a part time or a GA due to cohort size of grad students.
Course Curriculum
10
- The difficulty of the course is medium and consists of both the article and practical courses. For example, I have a principles of machine learning course this semester and it is a theory course; on the other hand, principles of data science is another course as a practical one, where I have to do a project.
- Positive aspects of my course are that it is very extensive and gives you real-time application of the subject and the negative aspect is that I feel it includes more current trend topics such as generative AI. I have three classes this semester, and these are scheduled three days a week. Usually the classes happen in the evening between 5 and 9pm. The average number of students in my class is around 50 and the number of Indian students enrolled would be around 35 to 40.
Admission Experience
- The universities I applied to and their status:
- University of Washington, Seattle ( rejected )
- University Of California, Irvine ( rejected )
- New York University ( rejected )
- Northeastern University ( admitted )
- Columbia University ( rejected )
- University of California, San Diego ( rejected )
- University of Michigan, Ann Arbor ( rejected )
- University of San Francisco ( admitted )
- Texas A&M College Station ( rejected )
- Indiana University Bloomington (admitted )
- University of Southern California ( rejected )
- University of Pennsylvania ( rejected )
- University of Maryland, College Park ( admitted )
- I confirmed my admission from the University of Maryland, College Park.
- I think I was rejected from the other universities because there was a lot of competition for the university. I think most of the universities were looking for people with work experience and if there was no work experience then a CGPA of 9.0.
- I chose the University of Maryland, College Park, because of its reputation in the computer science field, its extensive coursework, and its research-based university.
- The application process for UMD was pretty basic. I had to fill out an application form (which was around $70). The university asked for a SOP, three letters of recommendation, and a write-up on community involvement, engagement in leadership roles, facilitating change, and overcoming social, economic, educational, and physical barriers. The university did not ask for GRE scores; however, they did ask for the IELTS score.
- The GRE was waived off by the university. However, they required an English proficiency exam. I submitted my IELTS. The minimum requirement for IELTS is listening (7.0), reading (7.0), speaking (6.5), and writing (7.0).
- The overall admission experience was pretty easy; once you filled out the application form, they would email you about the decision. The university does not ask for deposits once you get admitted, unlike some universities, which helped me a lot. Apart from the regular SOP and LOR, the admission required three essays (a write-up on community involvement, engagement in leadership roles, facilitating change, and overcoming social, economic, educational, and physical barriers), which took some time. But overall, the admission was a very smooth process.
- I applied for the Fall 2024 intake. UMD has rolling admissions, and I applied on March 14, 2023, and got my decision late April.
- I got accepted into UMD in late April and they provided me with an offer letter. UMD does not ask for deposit and you can just accept the offer and apply for the i20. This is what I did.
- They had asked me certain details for the i20 process and once provided, I got my i20 in two weeks.
Faculty
10
- The faculty-to-student ratio is one to 50 and this ratio is pretty good. I feel because the professor gives individual attention to everything everyone says during class. The professor shares a PPT and explains a topic and we take handwritten or digital notes. These presentations are shared with us online, where we can refer to them later as well.
- The teaching content I feel is medium and I think they should give more real-time examples in scenarios so that we can prepare ourselves to secure a job in my field. I don’t think faculty members assist students in finding a part-time or full-time job through personal or reference; however, we can approach professors for graduate assistantships.
- I had admired my Principles of Data Science course professor because she takes so much effort in making the class very engaging and talks about real-time application of the topics. Recently she had been injured and still she came to class and conducted the class full fledged.
Campus Life
10
- There are many events which happened, especially during the first week, there was silent the school painting, events, bowling events, and so much more. It was so fun and we could mingle with other people. The facilities available on campus are a lot the library. There is a full fledged recreation centre and of course good medical services as well, the major even would be the homecoming week where it was like a famous football match, which happened between the university of Maryland and the University of Southern California, apart from that there is Maryland and so much other more events.
- Never was something called the first look fair where all the student organisations and clubs came up with stalls and introduced their clubs to everyone, and we could join by signing up at the event.
Part Time Jobs
- With regards to TA and RA, it’s quite competitive. However, there are plenty of part-time jobs available, which are competitive too but could be secured with some recommendation. The average pay for student workers is $17 and for RA/TA they get tuition remission and apart from that, around $1000 to $2000 monthly. For greater positions, it is $18 per hour.
- Other on-campus job include front desk, dining services, etc.
- As an international student with our F1 visa permit, we are allowed to work only 20 hours a week.
- On average, a student earns $17 per hour in the part-time job. Usually, it is easy to balance between part-time jobs while studying because the hours do not overlap, but however, some part-time jobs can be tiring. For one to apply for part-time jobs, they have to go around the campus to each building and ask for part-time jobs, which is the easiest way. Another way is that they can go to ejobs.com and find openings for part-time jobs. Yet another way is through recommendation; if you know any seniors on campus and if they tell you that position is open and recommend you, you can get the job (word of mouth).
Placement
10
- Almost 98% of the batch placement within six months of the course. The average salary range is $80,000–$150,000. There is a carrier fair, which happened where companies came and put up stalls and spoke to students.
- Apart from that, students applied through other platforms like LinkedIn, Handshake, referrals, etc. Since the University of Maryland is close to DC, many government companies hire students from this university, and apart from that, companies like Bank of America hire students.
Accommodation
Off Campus
10
- As a graduate student on campus, housing does not apply so I went through campus housing. I’m staying in an apartment close by to college and just called the Parkside Apartments. The monthly rent for my accommodation is $610; the utilities might cost $20 per month. I’m staying in an apartment mainly because of safety reasons and the amenities available.
- I did not find any challenges while securing accommodation because I discussed with seniors who are already living here and made my decision real quick. For future students, I would recommend choosing an apartment because of safety reasons and the amenities available. I would recommend them to start early because they gave some early bird offers for the rent.
- My accommodation is a five-minute walk to the campus. I chose this accommodation because it’s closer to the building I chose my classes for. Most of the Indian students stay at Graduate Hills or Graduate Gardens.
Exams
- I wrote IELTS and PTE as part of the admission process.
- UMD required a SOP, CV, and 3 LOR as a part of the admission.
- I also submitted three other write-ups about my community involvement, leadership skills, and overcoming social, economic, and physical barriers.
- Interviewing was not part of my application process. They did not have any interviews, and only the above-mentioned list was considered for my admission process.
Fees
- The tuition fee is $4,146 per course and during the 2-year masters degree, we will need to complete 10 courses. So in total it would be $41,460 (just the tuition fee).
- I am staying in an apartment near campus and the rent for a shared room I am paying is $610 (I got it for an early bird discount). The minimum rent for an apartment is around $500 on an average and for a private room it is $900.
- The fees are charged semester-wise. For my particular course, I should take 9 credits per semester, which is 3 courses, so I pay $12,438 per semester.
- Transportation is completely free around campus. I mean the shuttle bus to the university and nearby places. If you want to go in the metro, its chargeable; on weekdays it's around $5 and on weekends around $2.5.
- Grocery shops are very limited around this area, with only 2 supermarkets. However, you can order online. On average, the monthly groceries for me are around $100. There is also a good Indian store near the university (20 minutes by bus).
Scholarship
- There are no scholarships for my course. The data science program comes under the College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences (CMNS), and this school does not provide any scholarships for any of the courses under it.
- None of my batchmates got scholarships either.
- The University of Maryland provides scholarships for other schools but not CMNS.
