בימת דיקן הפקולטה למדעי המחשב והמידע
OMSCS—The Best Degree Program Ever?
Prof. Zvi Galil
Abstract
In January 2014, Georgia Tech launched an online Master of Science in Computer Science for under $7,000—a fraction of the $40,000 charged by comparable public universities and $70,000 at private institutions. What began with 5 courses and 380 students has become, by every measure, the largest academic degree program in the world in any subject: 52 courses, 19,000 enrolled students, and 16,500 graduates—more than 7,000 in the last three years alone. Applications doubled in the last 4 years to over 11,000 still climbing after more than a decade.
Harvard researchers concluded that OMSCS is the first rigorous evidence that an online degree program can increase educational attainment, projecting it will raise the number of annual MS CS graduates in the United States by at least 7%. The program has catalyzed more than 50 similar programs at over 30 universities worldwide. In November 2023, Forbes called it the best degree program ever.
This talk describes how OMSCS came about, what Georgia Tech has learned from twelve years of running it, and what it reveals about the future of higher education—a future in which online learning plays a far larger and more consequential role than most institutions have yet imagined.
Biography
Zvi Galil is the Frederick G. Storey Chair in Computing and Executive Advisor to Online Programs at Georgia Tech, where he served as Dean of Computing from 2010 to 2019. He was the driving force behind Georgia Tech’s Online MS in Computer Science—now the largest academic degree program in the world in any subject—and has been a leading architect of the movement to deliver rigorous, affordable graduate education at global scale.
Previously, Galil served as Dean of Engineering at Columbia University (1995–2007) and as President of Tel Aviv University (2007–2009). His research spans the design and analysis of algorithms, complexity, cryptography, and design of experiments; he has authored more than 200 scientific papers and lectured in over 30 countries.
He holds BS and MS degrees in Applied Mathematics from Tel Aviv University (both summa cum laude) and a PhD in Computer Science from Cornell. He has received honorary doctorates from the University of Waterloo in mathematics and from Columbia University—the first honorary doctorate in computing Columbia has awarded. He is a Fellow of the ACM and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a member of the National Academy of Engineering, and recipient of the 2025 Michael Pupin Medal from the Columbia Engineering Alumni Association.
