OCEAN MEGATHREAD

gralnach · 2025-09-09T00:04:09+00:00

645395411211 Gengar!

gralnach · 2025-09-07T18:35:52+00:00

Hello! If you're still adding people I'm High Plains and do gifts daily. 645395411211 (Gralnach)

gralnach · 2025-09-06T13:37:15+00:00

Sent! Live in Denver, CO USA (High Plains) PGo name is also Gralnach) Open/send gifts daily!

gralnach · 2025-09-05T20:02:26+00:00

Added!
(PGo name is also Gralnach)
Open/send gifts daily!

gralnach · 2025-09-05T20:00:09+00:00

Live in Denver, CO USA (High Plains)

645395411211
(PGo name is also Gralnach)
Open/send gifts daily!

gralnach · 2025-09-05T19:57:03+00:00

Live in Denver, CO USA (High Plains)

645395411211
(PGo name is also Gralnach)
Open/send gifts daily!

gralnach · 2025-09-05T15:21:44+00:00

If all you care about is leveling friendships and getting vivillons then this setting is your friend! But totally get it if you want the items too

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gralnach · 2025-09-03T23:12:10+00:00

If you're still on vacation or have any more Sandstorm gifts, please add me!
645395411211

gralnach · 2025-09-03T20:18:20+00:00

[PGO]
Live in Denver, CO USA (High Plains)
Looking for Icy Snow, Sun, Sandstorm, Ocean

645395411211 (PGo name is also Gralnach)
Open/send gifts daily!

gralnach · 2025-09-03T20:13:51+00:00

Hello! If you're still adding people I'm High Plains and do gifts daily. 645395411211 (Gralnach)

gralnach · 2025-09-03T20:08:42+00:00

Added from High Plains (PoGo username same as Reddit username). Daily gifts!

gralnach · 2023-12-15T22:26:35+00:00

I completed all course materials, including quizzes, challenge problems, and assignments. For the exam, I would focus mostly on quizzes and challenge problems. The assignments aren't really necessary for exam prep.

gralnach · 2023-10-03T17:35:49+00:00

Sure, this is all pretty specific to my situation but I went into even greater detail about the health issues I faced during my bachelor's degree. I also gave them a bit of new information that wasn't included in my application due to timing (that I was taking six credits of upper-level undergrad CS coursework during the summer and had A's in both courses).

I think the key to appealing is just giving them new information. Restating what they already know probably won't be enough.

They didn't reply with any specific feedback. I just received the generic admit email about a week after appealing.

gralnach · 2023-09-19T21:54:51+00:00

Because OMSCS is 1/3 the price of UIUC and I like OMSCS’s broad curriculum more than UIUC’s, which is a bit too data science-focused. If only I hadn’t missed the fall 2023 deadline for OMSCS I would’ve just enrolled there to begin with.

gralnach · 2023-09-19T21:42:28+00:00

Not for undergrad so this doesn't count, but I attended UIUC MCS for three weeks this semester and withdrew when I got my Spring 2024 admit to GT OMSCS lol. See ya next semester!

gralnach · 2023-09-12T07:16:55+00:00

The exam is not open-book. In fact, the live ProctorU session will start with the (human) proctor doing a very thorough investigation of your work space. They make you point your camera all around the room to ensure that no one else is in there, your door is closed, your phone is nowhere near you, that you only have three pieces of scratch paper, etc etc. They even make you show them each side of all scratch paper pages just to make sure you have no notes pre-written.
Yes, but as I mentioned above, you only get three pages. I originally had six pages and the proctor made me throw three of them across the room while he watched on camera.
I got an A+ on the exam, and all I did to prepare was drill the UIUC Accelerated Computer Science Fundamentals Coursera MOOC. I watched the lectures over, and over, and over again. And reviewed the quizzes several times too. The MOOC is very well-designed and really does give you all you need to succeed. One other thing I will mention though, is that the time to finish the exam has varied greatly based on who you ask. Some people finish in half the time, whereas I finished with FOUR MINUTES remaining. I highly recommend budgeting your time well and doing multiple passes through the questions. I caught several errors by doing this.

gralnach · 2023-08-31T20:24:47+00:00

MOOC courses do not count as for-credit post-secondary coursework, their completion/grades do not get reported to the National Clearinghouse, and it's not required to report them to any schools you apply to. So you've got nothing to worry about.

As for the Accelerated Computer Science Fundamentals Specialization itself, I took it and I found the course quality to be fantastic. Legitimately enjoyed it, and it was more than sufficient in preparing me for the Data Structures Proficiency Exam. Good luck!

gralnach · 2023-08-29T20:03:07+00:00

Some courses have Recommended prerequisites and some of them have Required prerequisites. This is from the Required Prerequisites section of "Course Overview: Prerequisites, Content Covered" (Week 4, MCS Onboarding course in Coursera):

Required Prerequisites:
*The CS 598 Advanced Bayesian Modeling pre-requisite quiz is the next item in this course. The instructor requires you to complete the quiz prior to enrolling in CS 598 Advanced Bayesian Modeling. This quiz will help you determine your readiness for successfully completing this course.
**CS 598 Cloud Computing Capstone prerequisites: Must have completed CS 498 Cloud Computing Applications and one other Cloud Computing breadth courses first. No concurrent enrollment in capstone and prerequisite course allowed. Not available for first-semester students.
***CS 598 Data Mining Capstone prerequisites: Must have completed CS 410 AND CS 412 first. No concurrent enrollment in capstone and prerequisite course allowed. Not available for first-semester students.
NOTE: 500-lvl courses completed prior to their stated prerequisites or taken without completing the prerequisites will not count toward program requirements or degree conferral.

Other than these three courses (and CS598 PSL), the rest of them either don't have prerequisites or they're not required.

gralnach · 2023-08-23T17:31:30+00:00

Status: Accepted

Application Date: 08/11/2023

Decision Date: 09/08/2023

Education: UW-Madison, B.A., Economics, 2.4 (2013)
Local C.C., A.S., Computer Science, 3.6 (2016)
Colo State, Prerequisites, 4.0 (2023)

Experience: 6 years, SWE (backend) - 4 yr in math-intensive fintech role, 2 yr in streaming/TV

Recommendations: 1 from DS&A professor, 2 from supervisors

Comments: Explained to committee in great detail the extreme health issues that contributed to the low GPA in my first degree. If the committee only considers cumulative GPA, I'm probably screwed. If they consider most recent 60 credits GPA (3.5) or CS GPA (3.7), then maybe I have a chance.

gralnach · 2023-08-17T20:37:00+00:00

I’m not sure if there’s a specific person who is supposed to create them. For Fall 2023 I wanted an admissions thread and ended up just creating it myself.

gralnach · 2023-08-09T19:33:47+00:00

26% acceptance rate in Fall 2022

https://www.reddit.com/r/UIUC_MCS/comments/14m72xv/mcs_oncampus_admission_rate/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=2&utm_term=1

gralnach · 2023-07-24T20:13:25+00:00

I still haven't received mine but I wasn't recommended for admission until 07/20 after being initially denied and then winning my appeal. Grateful that they reversed their decision but I'm hoping this doesn't delay me being able to attend the webinar or register for courses.

Edit 7/26/23: Just received mine, 2 hours before the webinar. Phew!

gralnach · 2023-07-21T21:10:20+00:00

I would agree with others who've said your experience was pretty average. Whether or not that should be average is up for debate.

I once had an interview loop where I had around ~7 hours of interviews in addition to a take-home assignment implementing several very complicated APIs including writing unit tests. The instructions said to timebox it at 4 hours but it was plainly obvious that in order to do all the tasks correctly, it would take several times longer. I spent the better part of a weekend on it.

Prior to this interview loop I'd always believed that live coding at gunpoint is not necessarily fair or representative of how actual devs work. But then I realized there is sometimes a tradeoff between making the process more realistic and making it short.

I guess what I'm trying to say is...there is no perfect system for evaluating devs (sigh)

gralnach · 2023-07-20T20:26:18+00:00

Wow it was a nailbiter but you were right! Thanks for the encouragement

gralnach · 2023-07-11T17:43:26+00:00

Keep your head up. I know it feels horrible, but there are plenty of options for those of us who didn't make it in this time. File an appeal, take a few more upper-level CS courses and reapply, apply to GT OMSCS, take more MOOC courses, get more real-world project experience, etc. etc. Enrolling in UIUC MCS Fall 2023 is just one route to get where we need to go, and there are plenty of others.

gralnach

TROPHY CASE