FWIW, in the systems side Northwestern has stolen many of CMU's courses, including the OS, networking, and intro systems course. If you're interested in theory,

FWIW, in the systems side Northwestern has stolen many of CMU's courses, including the OS, networking, and intro systems course. If you're interested in theory, well, get ready to get your ass handed to you by Lance Fortnow. I've also competed in ICPC and finished an internship at Microsoft. What I saw most often at the elite schools was that they cultivated enthusiasm better than many of their peers. I'm self-driven to be good at what I do but many people are not (e.g., nontrivial programming outside of class (I know, I don't understand how CS majors can not do that)). Hard classes make even the less driven compete in a higher class of difficulty. Side-note: why are so many people saying "I went to a Big Name university" instead of just saying what university? The graduating classes aren't that small that it's totally personally identifiable and the benefit to readers is probably tangible.