1. something to consider wrt the proposition of trying to learn everything from MOOCs, which i thought of when reading your comment mentioning partner exercises, is the social & collaborative aspect of it. a bunch of meta-educational stuff i've been reading & discussing lately has been about how much students teach each other - how much learning goes on outside the classroom, and the discrepancy in ability/success in the absence of that learning.
2. the biggest difference i've realized between taking first/second-year CS courses and actually being able to work as a programmer is the ability to spec out a project from the beginning & iterate on that design. courses like OS teach this by basically throwing you in the deep end - your grade depends on figuring out that process, but there's no real guidance. software engineering courses are a little more systematic about it, iiuc, but i've never actually taken one - it might be something to consider. along similar lines, it might be worth trying something like summer of code or other contributions to open source - build up a portfolio on github; do some projects start-to-finish - and whether or not that's impressive to an admissions committee, i get the sense that it's more impressive to a hiring committee than a fancy degree.
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1. something to consider wrt the proposition of trying to learn everything from MOOCs, which i thought of when reading your comment mentioning partner exercises, is the social & collaborative aspect of it. a bunch of meta-educational stuff i've been reading & discussing lately has been about how much students teach each other - how much learning goes on outside the classroom, and the discrepancy in ability/success in the absence of that learning.
2. the biggest difference i've realized between taking first/second-year CS courses and actually being able to work as a programmer is the ability to spec out a project from the beginning & iterate on that design. courses like OS teach this by basically throwing you in the deep end - your grade depends on figuring out that process, but there's no real guidance. software engineering courses are a little more systematic about it, iiuc, but i've never actually taken one - it might be something to consider. along similar lines, it might be worth trying something like summer of code or other contributions to open source - build up a portfolio on github; do some projects start-to-finish - and whether or not that's impressive to an admissions committee, i get the sense that it's more impressive to a hiring committee than a fancy degree.