Anyone going for the bs in cyber operations online? What’s been your experience so far?! What made you choose this over another online college?

Hello! I'll be attending DSU starting the fall 2024 semester, i was wondering if i need to be currently attending in order to join the student discord, or if thats something i could join now?

What is the time commitment for CSC 748 online? How many hours per week? Does self-paced mean read content, finish projects, and take exams?

Are there group projects or a delay in when modules in the course are released?

How involved are the online courses in the MSCS, if taking one at a time?

hi guys, I am considering to apply for the DSU cyber defend doctoral program. However I noticed that the DSU website explicitly requires 3.0+ undergraduate GPA for admission to this program. Unfortunately, I only got 2.7 undergraduate GPA, however, I recently received 3.9 GPA for CS master degree from a local state university. Is that possible for me to get waived by this 3.0 undergraduate GPA requirement? thank you for any suggestion.

Hey all,

I see a lot of cyber information, programs, and questions throughout the boards but nothing much on DSU's PhD IS program. Even those who have asked question about the program, have so far not received much of a response.

I, too, am considering DSU as an online option for a PhD in general IS after I complete my current program which is a third master's degree. Any information about acceptance, the value of the program (either within academia or outside in the industry), or anything else that may be relevant?

Thanks!

I am applying soon to DSU (hopefully) and id like to ask about living costs in madison and rent and where i can check for available apartments for rent as it doesnt seem like there are any

Hi — I’m thinking of applying to the PhD IS program at DSU. Apart from the 27 masters degree credits, can I transfer any other coursework to waive additional courses? I’m a a PhD student at another U.S. university so I have additional courses to transfer. How many can I waive? I want to have to take as few courses as possible.

I applied to the 2024Fall PHDIS program, does anyone know the approximate backgrounds of students who have previously entered the program?

Hi, all. I have been researching available online MS CS/Cyber programs and really like what I see at DSU.

It seems like I have a lot to catch up on for pre-reqs, but here's my background to shed some light on my further questions.

Undergrad School: Towson University Degree: Bachelor's of Music (Performance Concentration) Year of Graduation: 2008

Occupation: software engineer Years of Experience (engineering): 6

I'm self-taught and work for a very successful company in the cyber industry. I love my job and want to get a traditional education (MSCS with a cyber ops track). Why do I want a masters?

1. I learn best with structured learning pathways. I need something rigid to keep me on track.
2. having a degree that validates my years of experience and chosen occupation is important to me.

Given my education and work experience, it seems like I would need to take, at minimum, the GRE. The course site shows other areas that knowledge of needs to be proven. "...Data Structures, Assembly Language, Operating Systems, Language Processing, Programming Languages, Discrete Mathmatics."

I haven't spoken to anyone at DSU about this yet. If any previous or current student fall into my scenario (non-cs undergrad, but swe experience), would you mind sharing your experience with meeting the program admission pre-reqs?

Also, please share your experience in the MSCS Cyber Operations program if you have the time.

This program seems quite good. Thanks!

I was wondering if anybody has taken or is taking the computer game design major, I want to do game design as a career. I have a lot of experience in programming, I've taken both AP Comp Sci classes at my school. I also took a web development class and I'm going to take a game design class at my high school. I do programming as a hobby kinda on my own time as well. I wanted to know if anybody has gotten a successful career off of the game dev major.

Wondering if anyone has taken an Exit Exam at DSU just wondering what is it like. For example will I be tested on all the course I took throughout the years? Or will it be more specific to my major? Im trying to figure out how to study for something like it.

I am planning on obtaining a staff job at DSU this coming Fall. I need to live close to the campus ideally (at least somewhere in Madison). Can someone give me advice on the apartment landscape in Madison? I would prefer not to have roommates and a studio or 1 bedroom would be ideal.

Thanks.

I recently graduated with my BS in Cybersecurity Technology from UMGC and I’ve been looking at different master programs. I’ve looked at this one and SANS Technology Institute’s Masters in Information Security Engineering. Has anyone taken this program? I’ve tried to find reviews but can’t seem to find much. I’m attracted to the technical track that it offers.

1. How is the program like for online students?
2. Is it more theoretical or lab based hand s-on?
3. Is it easy to get in touch with professors?
4. Is the material enough and instructions are clear or google is your teacher based learning?
5. How is the alumni community and is it easy to get a job after or in middle of the program and easy to get opportunities for online students?

And finally what would your advice and do’s and don’ts Thank you(I m in Texas)

For more details, hmu through the following

Discord: frontieronlinetutors#7504

Email: frontieronlinetutors@gmail.com

I hope to talk to you soon. Thank you

Hello,

My employer writes me a refund check for my classes once I receive my final grade ….my deadline to pay for the class was yesterday but the system was down and I couldn’t pay / sigh up for the payment plan.

My question … what is Dakota State University penalties for not paying on time? I see they say they’ll charge a fee .. but is it only a one time fee and does anyone know for how much?

Haha all comes down to … what’s cheaper? Credit card interest or pay the fee .. that’s unknown to me right now.

Thanks!

Hello,
I am looking into Phd - Cyber Operation and one of the requirement there is you must have masters in Computer Science. I completed my undergrad in BSC. Networking and cybersecurity and MS in Information System. I have been working as Malware analysis for past 1 year. The reason i am interested in CO is due to its courses like reverse engineering and Malware analysis. Has anyone with non CS degree applied and got into the program? What would you suggest, just forget it and save time or give it a shot..
Thank you

I work full time Mon-Fri 7-3:30 and was thinking about going to this school once I receive my AA. Does anyone else have experience studying here and working? If so, how is it? Is the school or professors flexible with you?

I am looking for anyone who is in this program or recently completed to provide any general feedback or recommendations on this program.

I can’t seem to find much information from current students and looking for their perspective. Thanks

If you missed Part 1 its here: https://www.reddit.com/r/DSU/comments/mnqaem/review_of_dsus_online_computer_science_degree_so/

TLDR: DSU continues to be a great experience for me, I'm learning a ton and think the quality of education is still very high.

Classes I've taken since the last part.

CS Classes:

CSC-314 Assembly language: This was just a really cool class. Coding in x86 Assembly is just fun and the instructor Andrew was just great. he had great lectures with challenging but super fair assignments. I learned so much here and thoroughly enjoyed the class.

Parallel Computing

CSC 410: My first ouch class. While the professor was knowledgeable on all things code and parallelization I don't think he relayed that information to the students very well. Assignments were vague, lectures were vague, feedback was very vague. This class is in my semester of B's but what sucked about this one was that not all of my assignments were graded. We were 'offered' a grade. We could take a chance and do the final in order to get all of our assignments graded but were told "it will be very hard to improve a letter grade". I'm just not sure about that method of feedback. Assignments were interesting once you figured out what needed to be done though.

Programming Languages

CSC 461: Big ouch. Again in the semester of B's for me. This one felt off to me as well though. Prof Kreb is good at lecturing, and he said read the book. Well I skimmed it, but I watched every lecture and took notes. Good information is here, and a whole hell of a lot of it. The only thing that took me by surprise was that the first test felt as if the it was on Hard mode, and I did fairly good on it. Then the second test was on Impossible (you're going to die ok) mode. Then the last test was on Veteran mode. The middle test really got me (I'm talking 60%ish), and it hurt. Thankfully assignments and the other tests carried me to a B.

Math:

Calculus I

MATH 123: A Mark Spanier class, dude just kills it with lecturing, worksheets, tests. Calculus is scary for me, but Mark made it pretty great. His lectures are awesome and really helpful with all the examples he provides. He assigns a lot of worksheets, but they aren't graded for correctness just completion, but he still provides great feedback which helps you roll into the harder (but still fair) homework problems with more confidence. I have him for two classes this current semester and its pretty great so far!

Discrete Mathematics

MATH 316: The semester of B's! Prof. Altmann is a good lecturer, and provides great feedback on homework. But she grades pretty hard! I scored above 87's-93's on all 4 of the classes tests but just could not pull off the A in the end... With only 6 Homeworks (1 was dropped), one bad score can really mess you up. I think I finished the course with a 88%, but I did defiantly learn a lot. You have to note take, study, and do lots of practice problems. I really wish I got an A in this class for how hard I worked but still felt accomplished after I finished it.

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Gen Eds:

PHIL 100

Introduction to Philosophy: This class was pretty fun. Reading from a book, discussion posts, worksheets, and a paper or two. I took this course at BHSU (another University in the South Dakota system), and for some reason can't find the instructors name. Felt like an online course but still contained good information and I enjoyed it.

CMST 101

Fundamentals of Speech: Was a pretty fun class! 4 recorded speeches and a bunch of work through an online system. We were allowed to pick speech topics and the professor was pretty liberal on what you could pick from. I did one speech on the Volkswagen Harlequin (a funky multicolored car VW made). Decently easy class if you are comfortable speaking to a camera.

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Currently taking:

Operating Systems

CSC 456 - Dying, and anxious for my first test

MATH 436

Number Theory and Cryptography - lots of worksheets, but solving complex math through code is a lot of fun.

Foundation of Computation

CSC 404 - Lots of worksheets but this class is fun. Turing machines, NFAs, algorithms, its pretty neat!

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Planned summer classes:

MATH 125

Calculus II

CSC 234

Software Security

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And that's it for the last two semesters. One thing that I'd like to find out about is internships for online students. I'm currently employed full time so I can't exactly take an internship (still not sure if I even want to go full softdev yet too). I have one friend who has had two internships already, but I'd like to ask around to a few other people and see what they say. All in all DSU is still great.

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Updated pro's and con's of DSU so far

Pro's:

-Discord Help Night is awesome, I continue to use this frequently.

-With most classes being mixed of online and campus students, I've been invited to multiple class based discords that have been super helpful for studying.

-Great majority of classes don't feel cookie cutter or "generic online" like I read about how some online programs are. Only have had 2 or 3 cookie cutter feeling classes, all being gen-ed.

-Staff and Professors have all been great and respond quickly (pro of small school).

-D2L online learning environment is wayyyy better then Blackboard the my CC used.

-I regularly gets emails of scholarships that I am eligible for even though I live in Cali and am a remote student.

Con's

-2-3 of the classes have been cookie cutter/generic online classes

-You pay a electronic delivery fee (Why?)

-I recently learned a D is passing grade for most classes for degrees including Computer Science. This is kind of weird to me as usually a D isn't failing but cant be used to fulfil a prereq for another course. At DSU it can and you graduated as long as you are over a 2.50 GPA. (I may just be ignorant here, this is based off my limited knowledge.)

I'm looking at applying to the Phd Cyber defense program at Dakota state. I have a Msc Cybersecurity from another school. Do they allow transfer of credits from other school's masters program into the PhD program? If they do, how many credits can you transfer? Also, are the classes research base or course based? Anyone have an idea? Thank you.

I’m 19.

Looking up school demographics for a DSU is generally jacked up because it includes online students.

Most show 60 male / 40 female - is that accurate?

I'm going to be a student in 2022 and I am wondering what the discord link is for the Esports team.