Graduate Studies in Computational Linguistics

We have a very high placement rate among our alumni. Students who have successfully completed the program have gone on to get good positions in companies working in CL or in select PhD programs right after or very soon after graduation. The most successful are those who actively participate not only in the courses, but in the many networking opportunities and seminars that we offer throughout the year. Alumni frequently participate in these events, allowing students to get an idea of what it's like to work in specific companies and industries.

The range of positions graduates of the program have taken is very wide. Some take positions in companies specifically focused on CL, such as Basis and Luminoso. Others are in a range of industries that have commercial or research groups working in CL, which range from consumer facing companies, such as Amazon and Rakuten, to healthcare, such as QPID and Partners Healthcare, to research companies, such as BBN and Mitre. You can see the full range of placements on our Alumni page.

It is optional, but recommended in certain instances, for students to submit GRE scores. GRE quantitative scores are most helpful to the admissions process when a student has no record of strong performance in an accredited, undergraduate level math course. We first recommend that students in this situation take an accredited, undergraduate-level math course (preferably a discrete math course), if possible. If enrolling in a course is not an option, then we strongly recommend taking the GRE.

While math course performance is a very helpful indicator for whether an applicant has the necessary math skills to be successful in our program, we recognize that many of our applicants have not taken college-level math, which is why there is the option of taking the GRE. The reason why we look for strong performance in a math course or on the GRE is because success in CL and in programming relies on a strong ability in mathematics.

Yes. If you are accepted into our program, you will take several core linguistics courses to fill in your background as part of your MS coursework.

We frequently accept students with academic backgrounds outside of computer science or math. While we do not have prerequisites for applying to the program, we would like to share some recommendations for preparing for your application. As much as possible, your application materials should demonstrate your quantitative and programming ability.

If you have not yet taken any programming courses at the undergraduate (or post-undergraduate) level from an accredited institution, then we recommend that you take at least one accredited introductory programming course. If you have to pick just one programming language to study before you enter, choosing Python will allow you the smoothest and most comfortable transition to our program. This is because it is the language used in the CL core courses taken by all students, including the one taken in the first semester. So, having some working knowledge of Python before starting will make that course much smoother for you.

Similarly, if you have not taken any math courses that are at least at the undergraduate level at an accredited institution, then we strongly recommend you enroll in an accredited, college-level math course, preferably a discrete math course (these are usually listed under the CS major sequence). If you are unable to enroll in a course or are not satisfied with your performance in the course that you take, then we strongly recommend that you take the GRE so that we have an additional metric for evaluating your quantitative skills.

If you have a course in mind and would like to receive feedback on it, please email the syllabus to our admissions coordinator: scigradoffice@brandeis.edu.

Taking these courses early on will help you to determine whether the program will be a good fit for you. Since achieving success in our program will depend on your programming and math skills, it will be helpful to know in advance whether you enjoy and have a knack for these subjects. Once again, there is no requirement for you to take any of these courses before you apply, but if you haven't taken them, it may be a good time to do this now as opposed to later in the process.

If you are admitted to our program and have not completed a programming course, with at least a B grade, at an accredited, post-secondary institution, this would mean that you would be admitted with the condition that you take an approved programming course and receive at least a B grade. If you are admitted to our program and have not completed a math course, with at least a B grade, at an accredited, post-secondary institution nor have submitted a GRE score, then you may be admitted with the condition that you take an approved discrete math course and receive at least a B grade. Please see additional FAQs below about conditional courses.

Special note for international applicants: If you have not taken an undergraduate level math or programming course, then it may be particularly helpful for you to take these courses before or while you are applying to our program. If you are admitted with the condition of taking a course, then we strongly advise you to complete the course by mid-May to avoid any delays with your visa.

Yes. However, if you are accepted into our program, it will be with the condition of getting a B or better in an introduction to programming course at an accredited, post-secondary institution.

The reason for this requirement is to make sure that our program and the field of CL will be a good fit for you -- and to allow you to be as sure of this as possible before beginning your studies with us.

Since CL involves lots of programming, we have found that adding this requirement allows students without prior study of CS to have a smoother first year than they would otherwise. It is part of what we do to try to set up every student in the program to do as well as possible throughout and succeed in getting a good job placement.

Programming takes a particular mindset, not just skillset. Most people who are interested in computational linguistics take to it very quickly, however some find that this is not something they want to build their career on. By taking a significantly rigorous course before entering, students who do well and choose to come have more confidence in their choice of career, clearer expectations of the work they will be doing, and better preparation for the programming assignments in the first semester.

Special note for international applicants: If you are admitted with the condition of taking a course, then we strongly advise you to complete the course by mid-May to avoid any delays with your visa.

Certain students may be admitted with the condition of taking a discrete mathematics course at an accredited, post-secondary institution and receiving at least a B grade. Students will fall into this category if they are a strong student in general but have neither taken a university level math course nor the GRE, which is optional but recommended for students without college-level math.

The reason for this requirement is to make sure that our program and the field of CL will be a good fit for you -- and to allow you to be as sure of this as possible before beginning your studies with us.

Since CL involves lots of mathematics (especially statistics and discrete mathematics), we think that adding this requirement allows students without prior study of mathematics to have a smoother first year than they would if they took this course with us, in their first year. We want students who enter the program to be in good shape to do really well in it so that they do go on to get good jobs or PhD student positions after they graduate.

If this course does not go well, we hope that both we and the student would be glad that they found out that a mathematics-intensive field like CL would not be a good fit for them before they invested the time, money, and energy of beginning a graduate program in it.

We hope that most of the time, the student will do well in the course – and then enter the program very prepared and excited to do more. We think this will be the case most of the time since those students we accept for admission (including with this requirement) usually show other evidence that they'll be good at math, even if they haven't done much of it yet.

We view this requirement as benefiting the accepted student as much as the program – it is part of what we do to try to set up every student in the program to do as well as possible throughout.

Special note for international applicants: If you are admitted with the condition of taking a course, then we strongly advise you to complete the course by mid-May to avoid any delays with your visa.

One of the most widely used languages in CL is Python. The following is by no means an exhaustive list, but just some books, tutorials and exercises that current and past students have found helpful.

• For students who want to develop more general computer science skills, you may want to take CS50 on edX. Please don’t pay for a certificate though!
• Python 101, Michael Driscoll (free): This is provides a very good, hands-on introduction. Chapters 1-11 are the most helpful and cover general Python content;
• Learn Python 3 the Hard Way, Zed A Shaw ($29.99): This is another hands-on tutorial and it has accompanying explanatory videos, but it isn’t free. If you want to try it out without paying, they offer a free sample.
• Learning Python 5th Edition, Mark Lutz (May be free through a library)
• Mysteries of the Pythonic Temple, Twilio: This is a very novel way of learning to use Python; you play an RPG game where the “battles” are programming challenges. It’s good for beginners and relatively fun, but if you have significant Python experience you may find it starts too slowly.
• Practice Python, Michele Pratusevich: This is a great set of exercises with solutions available.
• The Python Tutorial: This is the official Python tutorial. It does a good job of explaining Python’s core features, but it is designed for reader with significant programming experience. Chapters 1-9 cover general Python content and will be most relevant to you.

While our students advance in high paying careers (As of October 2022, PayScale reports that the average starting salary in this field is about $80,000), we understand concerns about tuition rates. Fortunately, our students can take advantage of the merit scholarships, jobs and internships that are available to them.

All students who are admitted to our program receive a merit scholarship. While we do not have the final award numbers for fall 2022, we can tell you that the award will be at least the equivalent of last year’s base award of $25,000 per year for up to two years for students who remain in good academic standing.

There are also part-time, hourly jobs that students can apply for on campus; these jobs do not include a tuition waiver. Hiring depends on current demand and the student’s qualifications for the particular position. Although we cannot guarantee you a position, we can tell you that most students in our program have a part-time job at some point during their time in the program. What you might want to take on evolves typically as you progress through the program:

• Course Assistantships (CAs): Students with a strong undergraduate degree in either linguistics or computer science can work as CAs for our undergraduate courses in those departments. 

• Research Assistantships (RAs): These positions are appropriate for students once they have developed their programming abilities, which may occur earlier or later in the program depending on students’ academic background and previous programming experience. There are several ongoing research projects in the department so there is frequently the need for students to work as annotators on corpora being built in our lab. There are projects going on both with data from English, Chinese, and some Russian.

• Tutoring: several of our students work elsewhere on campus, e.g. as English tutors for Brandeis’s English Language Program.

These positions may not be set until the start of the semester. However, we encourage admitted students who are interested in specific positions to reach out to the appropriate faculty member and share their resume. 

Off-campus, many of our students participate in paid internships in CL-related work in the Boston area and around the US, usually starting in the summer after their first year. Internship positions can range from annotation to programming to research. These are invaluable opportunities to gain real-world experience, build a professional network and get a job for post-graduation. Many students may also choose to continue internships during their 2nd year, or begin a new internship, and elect to use their internship in their last semester to count towards the program’s exit requirement.

Almost all students will complete an internship by the end of their program, and a majority of students opt to complete an internship during their last semester as part of the program’s exit requirement. This means that you would enroll in a 4 credit internship course to receive credit for the work that you are investing in your internship. The internship would be related to CL and would be approximately 15-20 hours per week.

In addition, whether or not students decide to pursue an internship for their exit requirement, they can pursue an internship at any other point during the school year or summer. Many of our students choose to participate in additional internships and to intern during the summer. Domestic students may choose to receive academic credit for these internships (although, this is not required), and international students will sign up for a 1-credit course as part of their CPT (curricular practical training) application requirements.

Most internships are paid and they typically pay a higher rate than on campus positions.

Special note for international applicants: Please find more information about internships and the CPT process on our International Students and Scholars website.

Our students graduate with highly developed programming skills and with the unique specialization in CL, which make them much sought after by employers. To help our students market themselves to prospective employers, we offer the following opportunities:

• One-on-one CL Faculty Advising: We encourage students to meet with our CL faculty to review their resume, practice for interviews and receive advice on the job search.
• Industry Receptions: We host these receptions a few times a year to expose students to different companies in the Boston area and around the country and help them build their professional network. Often the company representatives include alumni from our program who are very familiar with our curriculum and the unique skill-set of our students. Many of our students leverage these events to find internship and post-graduation job opportunities.
• Hiatt Career Center and GSAS’s Center for Career and Professional Development: Students can attend computer science career fairs and receive one-on-one career coaching on resumes, LinkedIn and job applications.
• CL Colloquium Talks: During the semester, we hold a weekly CL Colloquium that features prominent speakers from both industry and academia to discuss their cutting-edge research and work. We’ve had speakers from Amazon, Adobe, Basis Technologies, Call Miner and Interactions, for example. After the talks, participants have time to network and meet with the speakers, building their professional network.
• Program-Sponsored Career Events: During the year, our program hosts a number of talks on career-related topics. For example, we’ve hosted alumni panels and faculty talks on finding internships, applying to big tech jobs and preparing for a technical interview.

All students must complete an exit requirement, a thesis, capstone project and/or an internship during their last semester in the program, with the option of starting the requirement in a previous semester. The choice is up to each student, and sometimes, students may choose more than one exit requirement. Students who are completing a thesis, capstone and/or internship for their exit requirement will register for the appropriate 4-credit course to receive academic credit for their work. Here is a brief description of the three options:

• Internships: For the most part, an internship would be the prototypical choice for those who know they’re headed for an industry job. Students can expect to work on average 15-20 hours per week at an internship that is directly related to the CL field. Some students who are bound for PhD programs may also be interested in an internship. Internships that are more research-based or are at non-profit organizations rather than a typical for-profit tech company can be very satisfying for students interested in pursuing a PhD.
• Thesis: Students interested in pursuing a PhD program and research generally choose this option, although they can pursue a topic that is more applied in nature if they would like. This option includes writing a formal thesis based on the student’s research question and defending the thesis before their thesis committee and the CL community. We suggest that students think about potential thesis advisors early on and register for the thesis course for their two last semesters so that they have more time to work on it.
• Capstone Project: This independent project involves a substantial amount of work but tends to be more applied in nature than a thesis. At the end of the semester, students will present their project to their capstone advisor and the CL community and submit a written component. A capstone project is different from a thesis because the written component is not in a thesis format and there is no defense.

Please keep in mind that we’re always happy to talk things over with you and help you make a decision as the time to choose approaches. Particularly as students move into and through their second year in the program, this is frequently something they make appointments with Professor Goldberg, the Advising Chair for the program, and with other faculty to help talk over.