how is it, and do you think its more useful than cs?
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stats/data science majors
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The job market is just as fucked as CS if not worse. People with 5+ years of experience at FAANG are having trouble getting interviews.
You basically don't have a chance unless you got a referral, which I was very lucky to (shoutout my college roommates friend).
As a little story, my pc recently had a problem with its ram so i went to get it fixed, and the guy fixing it mentioned that his daughter studied data science. She had went to berkeley (tied for #1 school in the country for this, with Stanford and CMU), and couldn't get a job as a data scientist, so she's currently working as a Data Analyst (sort of a data-science adjacent job, less focus on ML/Stats, more on visualization) and will be for the foreseable future, until she can get enough experience to move up, which she won't know how long will last. This is very common.
if you like stats (its basically all probability and stats, virtually all of machine learning has a probabilistic interpretation) and enjoy it, then choose it. The job market is just as fucked tho. I once saw a posting that wanted 2 PHD's and Active Top Secret Security clearance. - A data scientist.
The double PHD + Top Secret security clearance requirement was by far the most outrageous one I saw (one PHD in ML/AI/Stats, the other in Engineering), but there's alot of postings that require alot more than what the actual 'job duties' list. I think a big problem is that the people who work in HR have no idea what Data Science/ML is outside of 5 min YT breakdowns they watched on it. You really don't need a PHD and 1+ years of experience to perform and understand a logistic regression. But they don't know that.
Good luck.
Always take the broader subject. CS includes data science and statistics. CS grads become quant researchers, Data Scientists and of course normal software engineers as well.
A stats and DS major degree will be as useful as a Electrical Engineering Degree in case you want to explore other domains in CS.
As an 18 y/o kid, most people don't even know what CS actually is. Take you time, take electives which interest you later on in your degree (3rd or 4th year) when you have more clarity about the subjects. If you like Stats and DS, just take up electives later on about the subject.
Not really. In India its idiotic to take statistics as a major if you are getting CS in a same level college.
In the US it is a viable option (truly) however only when you have clarity about what CS and statistics is.
Job market is more or less similar in both US and India cause at the end of the day most my batchmates as well got jobs in US companies (their hiring process and preferences is quite similar) and Indian startups just copy the US counterparts. (Even small startups asking DSA for founding engineer roles can be taken as an example).
In fact just to give you an example, the batch 1 year junior to me had CS, AI & DS and Electrical Engineering branches. During Campus placements Google allowed CS and Electrical but not AI & DS. Even for potential AI roles. Funny thing is, this was in an IIT of all colleges. This might sound comical but this is what happens when you take a very specialised major in your bachelors degree. Take narrow subjects in Masters or PhD, not your bachelors.
At the end of the day, it is clueless HRs which decide what the job market is like. HRs haven't caught up to the fact that majors such as Data Science exist. They just understand -
AI = CS
ML = CS
Data = CS
Stats = Maths/CS
Quant = PhD in Maths/CS
Your resume will probs not even pass ATS if it doesn't have Comp Sci. written on it.
Computer science majors are nerds everyone knows philosophy majors make the big bucks (all the philosophy majors i know work in fields that don't have to do with philosophy one bit)
but real shit, literally look at the job outlook
What exactly do you want to do as a computer science major? Work at a big company such as nvidia, or start your own gig? Are you doing it for money or because you enjoy working with computers? Does your college have a good computer science program? If so, does it have a high rate of graduates getting jobs after finishing the program?
there are a lot of factors you have to think about, dont just follow the numbers because youll easily burn out and most likely fail or quit
probably go for my own thing first - if it flops, i can try to join nvidia or something, if not, i can just keep working with it. have some vague ideas already, but we'll see because i'm still in high school.
i like computers, but also the money is convenient. i'm not gonna do any biology, or law, or anything like pharmaceuticals or physics. computers are the most interesting.
haven't been to college yet, which is why i'm asking. taking a stats course rn and it isn't bad, some of the stuff is pretty interesting. also enjoy calculus a lot. mainly i work with ML on the side.
Stats major here. Firstly you can't quantify Stats with Data Science equally. A Data Science major will put greater emphasis on coding and computer science related parts than Statistics where you will focus more on mathematics. Data Sc happens to be an area of work you can chose to work in with either stats or computer science back ground. Statistics in itself is a very analytical area of studies that requires a strong base in mathematics to excel at, and unless you are looking to do higher level studies like PHDs or some shit a Data Science/Computer Science Major would be a more compact option.
nah i know stats and data science are different its just that some colleges categorize them together, ill probably pursue data science over core statistics. i do pretty advanced math for NA high school, and i do ML, so i know some statistics already. im also taking a calculus based stats course next year, so ik what it is about.
edit: yeah i see what you mean i will probably pursue CS/DS over stats because PhD might be too time consuming
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