Computer Science
What if you could use your SQL expertise to help cable channel BBC America slash the time it takes to schedule ads...
Computer science is the
study of systems for
smart problem-solving
Up Close, In Person
“Serious Gaming” is the idea of using computing ideas from games and social media to solve real-world problems. Drew faculty and students together are developing a game-inspired platform for use in high schools.
We took over a room and declared it our student Teamwork Space. It looks like an internet start-up company: workstations, snacks and a fridge, a big plasma screen, game consoles for taking breaks and walls covered with math, diagrams and notes.
Our foundation is the ancient field of mathematics, with its deeply multicultural history. Even the word algorithm (rules for solving a problem in specific steps) can be connected both to algorism (computation with Arabic numerals) and the Greek arithmos (number).
It’s rare for undergrads to do the kinds of interdisciplinary research in the sciences and humanities that they do here. Students learn to communicate well with partners in different fields and understand their needs, a crucial skill for computer scientists.
Help us create Digital Mappaemundi (DM), a computer tool funded by national grants that
scholars worldwide can use to annotate images and texts.
Careers Made easy
Power Up
With the far-reaching impact of the internet, this is a heady and rewarding time to enter the field. At every scale—from tiny phone apps to global networks and research supercomputing—computer scientists are shaping the future.
Graduate with an impressive résumé packed with real research and internships, in addition to all your course work. Anybody who wants to can. We make that happen.
Our grads are prepared to jump right in to solving problems for large financial companies and power players like Google, or to be partners in ingenious start-up companies, making great ideas come to life.
Full-Impact Students
Rebecca Rupert
I intern with the ad-scheduling traffic team at BBC America. They were having problems with response times so I went into the databases, found the fields they needed and compiled them in a correctly organized SQL statement. It saved them 40 minutes off their day. Check out Rebecca’s audio slideshow.
Full-Impact Students
Ben Lynch
For Fairfield Advisors, a hedge fund here in Madison, N.J., I helped improve an automated program that buys products when they are trading below set averages and sells them as they revert to that average. Using this program, Fairfield Advisors estimates it earns an annual profit of about $500,000 a year.
Full-Impact Students
Tim Andres
I’m getting significant experience building a user interface for DM, the interactive scholarly research tool being developed at Drew in conjunction with Stanford University. I also play keyboards for a band called Friday Night Mistake.
Passionate Faculty
Shannon Bradshaw
Associate Professor
Together with students and a colleague in the English department, I’m building an environment called DM for the study and annotation of images and texts. The hope is that we open the door for new methods of scholarship to emerge. In between, I play pirates with my kids.
Ph.D., Northwestern University
Passionate Faculty
Barry Burd
Professor
I’m working on a book on Android app development, and new editions of two books on Java programming. I’m inquisitive, a definite computer geek and, at times, a bit of a goofball.
Ph.D., University of Illinois
Passionate Faculty
Steve Kass
Professor
My research interests include Lie algebras, on which I’ve published a book and several articles. In my spare time I sing in New York City’s Dessoff Choirs; we perform with Ray Davies of the Kinks from time to time.
Ph.D., University of Wisconsin
Passionate Faculty
Peter Likarish
Assistant professor
I’m working on a community-based fiction-writing project on Twitter. In my spare time I cook delicious delicacies that I may even share.
Ph.D., University of Iowa
Successful Alumni
- Systems administrator
Google - Director of software engineering
BlackRock investment firm - User interface developer
eMusic.com
—number of cookies professor Shannon Bradshaw bakes to decorate at a end-of-fall-semester party where people goof around and celebrate everyone’s hard work.
My Favorite Course
“You get a deep understanding of how the computer works from the ground up, as well as the history of why people built the systems they did. We learned so much.”
Tim Andres, on Operating Systems