Grad School [Master's Programs]

Well that time of my life has come and I am looking at grad schools. I am interested in PL and in particular the theory end of things (category theory - type theory - semantics). As I am an undergrad, it is really hard to get a good idea of where things are: e.g. I dont go to conferences, I don't have a strong grasp as where the field is heading, there is not much on the theory end of PL at my University.

Does anyone have any recommendations on universities?

Advice on how to evaluate universities?

Could someone give me a quick breakdown of the various departments and what they are strong at?

Icing : I would really like an English or partial English program in an non-English speaking country.

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English and partial english courses

We have a pretty theoretically oriented masters' programme in Computational Logic here in Dresden, if you fancy German as your ambient language. All courses and teaching in English, but you can take oral examinations in German if you feel confident enough. Details at the IM/ICCL Dresden homepage; several CL students have gone on to do PhDs here in Dresden and elsewhere in Europe, so it has been pretty good as a springboard.

We also have a teaching cooperation with the University of Lisbon if you are interested in Portugese; they are also putting together a less theoretical MSc course.

I've been meaning to compile a list of English language graduate programs in Germany for a while now; maybe I will get around to it in the next few days.

McMaster University

We have a large number of very theoretically-oriented faculty in the Computing and Software department at McMaster University. Many of us are ex-mathematicians, and we certainly have a higher-than-average number of faculty members who know and use category theory as well as type theory. In fact, we are just setting up a working group on applications of category theory to CS; we are also discussing setting up a working group on the topology of datatypes.

There is a lot of flexibility in course selection for the CS MSc programme. One could easily pick all theory courses, with most being directly relevant Programming Languages. Details at the CAS department homepage.

While Canada is (mostly) an English speaking country, there is enough French around to give things a different flavour. And in any case, our department is 80% filled with profs with English as their second (or third) language - one can hear quite a few languages in the halls.

How is that for shameless self-promotion? ;-)

Utrecht

You can find out about our Master's in Software Technology here.

Chalmers

You might want to look into Chalmers; they're in Sweden and have a pretty cool-looking international Master's program in dependable computer systems. I don't have direct experience, but they've got some big names in Haskell there and it's in Sweden.