Comp Sci difficulty Vs. Software Engineering difficulty

[x-ecutioner]

hi there,

a friend of mine told me that the SE program @ waterloo is one of the hardest programs you can take.

why is this so? is this true? What's is your opinion on this statement?

thanks,

x-ecutioner

[Tony]

I think one could certainly take a program more difficult than SoftEng.

If you are asking Computer Science vs. Software Engineering -- then the difference in difficulty mostly comes from the difference of material. Do you find Chemistry to be difficult? SoftEng needs that for Engineering accreditation. Do you find Math difficult? CS is in the faculty of Math (SE is half in Math, half in Eng).

[DemonWasp]

Your friend has clearly not been introduced to Engineering Science at the University of Toronto:
- 90% cutoff on admissions
- ~75% dropout rate in the first year alone
- 7-8 classes per term (which means roughly 12 hours / day school and homework)
- average grades are in the 60-70% range if you ignore the dropouts.

Aside from that, I agree with Tony.

[x-ecutioner]

oh good lol thanks for ur awesome responses
in addition,
i did a little bit of googling but still haven't found out, how long will it take to receive the degree in software engineering?

[[Gandalf]]

4 years, under "average" conditions?

[x-ecutioner]

define average

does it depend on the co-op placement?

someone told me the computer science undergrade @ waterloo takes 6 years
thats why i was wondering

[DemonWasp]

Considering that you alternate Coop - Uni - Coop - Uni, 6 years is probably a decent estimate. This doesn't really depend on co-op placement, as all co-op terms are 4 or 8 months.

[endless]

x-ecutioner @ Wed Sep 23, 2009 11:40 pm wrote:

define average

does it depend on the co-op placement?

someone told me the computer science undergrade @ waterloo takes 6 years
thats why i was wondering

5 years so long as no major problems occur.

[Prabhakar Ragde]

Regular (non co-op) CS is three years, eight months if you don't fail anything. If you do, you may be able to take an extra course at some point or some summer and graduate on time.

Co-op CS is four years, eight months if you don't fail anything, and you have two years work experience at the end of that.

SE is co-op only, so same timing as co-op CS. But because it's more constrained, some SE students stay on an extra term to take more stuff or finish up an option, so five years. If you fail enough in SE, you have to repeat a year, you can't fall behind by a term only.