3/4 years of a B.S. at a large research university, with 1 or 2 grad courses thrown in.
> DS&A classes..at WGU look completely watered down from what is taught in a single semester at the nearby university of Utah.
I agree with that. They do look watered down.
> They are talking about learning about hashmaps (how, at this point in their education???)
I checked the link and don't see what you are describing. One comment is talking about how to use a hashmap. But, I wouldn't be suprised if they didn't know what a hashmap was at all, since I've encountered that in undergrad at brick-and-mortar too.
> More than half the classes in the CS BS degree at WGU look like filler too
That's exactly how I feel about most gen-eds at a brick-and-mortar :)
But, I am actually learning things from these filler courses that were never taught at my university, nor taught at the workplace, which honestly did surprise me in a good way.
Just look at this reddit post from students taking this class and you'll learn everything you need to know https://www.reddit.com/r/WGU_CompSci/comments/maty9w/c950_da...
They are talking about learning about hashmaps (how, at this point in their education???) and it looks like the class can be completed by doing a single project. So yes, this is very unimpressive.
Example DS&A course at Utah: https://www.cs.utah.edu/~miriah/teaching/cs2420/ Following Algorithms course: http://theory.cs.utah.edu/fall18/algorithms/
More than half the classes in the CS BS degree at WGU look like filler too: https://www.wgu.edu/content/dam/wgu-65-assets/western-govern...