I can't really say how much better the U of A is compared to another university, but I can say after working for 3 years and doing 2 years of coop work, that they prepared me very, very well for working in the real world. The Computer program has a very solid base of mathematics, electrical engineering, and computing science courses.
The public high school where I grew up. Had a great time and basically have to say the same as my university experience. It prepared me very well for university.