“Congratulations! It is my pleasure to inform you that you have been accepted for admission into the part time Master of Science Software Engineering Technical Track Program at Carnegie Mellon West for the Fall 2006 semester.”
Hello Carnegie Mellon West
This, ladies and gentlemen, is the decision letter that I have been waiting for for so long. For the past several years, I have been contemplating about going back to school to obtain my master degree in software engineering, but my hands were tied due to community projects and the fact that mortgage payments are tying me down to my job (that I don’t want to leave anyways given that it’s such a dream job). In search for a part-time master’s program to good computer science schools in the bay area, I have been rejected by Stanford University, but accepted to the west campus of the prestigious Pittsburg-based Carnegie Mellon University.
And this couldn’t be any better program for me. As I was comparing this program to Stanford’s and other schools, I realize more and more that this program is just so perfect for me for a multitude of reasons:
- The program is only two years long, I’ll be graduating August 2008
- This is a part-time program allowing me to keep my full-time job
- My diploma will say “Carnegie Mellon University”, a top-tier university known for its excellence in computer science
- This is a very practical program emphasizing on completing software projects in small teams. There are no classes, nor exams, just deliverables—which is exactly what I am good at and what I have been doing for the past years at my work
- The campus (located on the NASA complex) is one mile away from my work. I can literally (and probably should) jog or bike there
- I was admitted to the Fall 2006 semester, which means school starts next month and I can use three years from my company’s tuition expense program for this two year program (see, it’s all planned out already! :) )
- PT and I are starting our master’s degree at the same time, while she completes hers already in January 2008
Source: US News
Thank Yous
I want to thank my Berkeley professor Mike Clancy, my former Expedia.com manager Melissa Yang, and Microsoft managers Steve Falkenburg and Chris Yerga for writing me excellent letters of recommendation. I need to thank DG and Sue Christensen as well as Nicole Nguyen, Dianne Le, Hai Ton and Derrill Dabkoski for reviewing and providing me with extensive feedback on many aspects of my lengthy applications. Thanks to Loc Nguyen to providing me answers to my many Java questions. A very, very special thanks goes to Orange County First District Supervisor (and future California State Senator) Lou Correa and her wonder-woman campaign manager (and my close friend) Tammy Tran for writing an excellent letter of recommendation, and lastly thank you to PhuongThao Le, who pushed me to look into other schools after my Stanford rejection, allowing me to stumble on this great program in the eleventh hour and for pushing me to do the application DURING the uNAVSA conference just in time to get it into the super-late admissions pool.
Good Bye Vietnamese Community
During my admissions interview and with discussions with other CMW students, I have been told to kiss my weekends good-bye. CMW is a very tough program. Given that I will be working full-time and getting my degree on a part-time basis, I will be extremely busy for the next two years, as I will be working on school work every evening and on weekends. As such, I have to take an extended leave of absence from the Vietnamese community… for real. It is time that I am concentrating and focusing on my education, and will therefore pull out of every Vietnamese community project and organization that I am currently involved in (with very few exceptions of course). I realize that this will be difficult for me to do, having been so involved in the community, but this is where I need your help and support. Over the next four weeks, I will transition out my responsibilities to other volunteers and will say ‘No’ to any future projects (go ahead, try and ask me). I am afraid I have to pull out of Lenduong’s Project Renaissance and with much sadness I realize that I can’t even attend DH5. I need your help in accepting my decision, not making me feel bad when I decline these things and, most importantly, I need your help to stop asking me to do this “one last final tiny thing”, because those many “one last final tiny things” do take up a lot of time. I am sure that I will come out for events here and there, but at least you won’t find me behind the scenes, so consider Minh T. Nguyen removed from the face of the Vietnamese community earth for the next two years. But don’t worry, in August 2008 I’ll be back… bigger and better.