Keeping Balance

For my last blog in the series of them, I will be discussing how to keep balanced social and work. This is possibly the most important aspect of university life. If you cant balance, something will go wrong. Yes you are at university to study and learn, but you are also there to discover new things about you.

You will have a lot of work to do compared to what you had at previous educational institutions. You will have reading, essays, revision and more to try and do. You will be given notice, you will have enough time to complete all of the tasks you are given. What it boils down to is time management, decide when you are going to do your work and stick to it. Use the facilities provided on campus and your own, and it will be easier than if you try to struggle with everything.

Socializing is also important. Now to clarify, I am not a dancer or drinker. I am not a fan of going out and getting drunk whilst clubbing every Saturday night. I prefer to socialize either online with friends (I'm a computing student, what do you expect) or I am at my Air cadet Squadron running that.

As I keep mentioning, the time balancing is important. The way I do it is I set aside time to socialize, I know that sounds odd doing it that way, but here is my reasoning. If I know when I have made plans to game, or when I am attending cadets, I have a goal to aim for when studying. I do studying in chunks of 40 mins on 20 mins relaxing. This is based on my information retention span (I took a test when I did my AS levels) so i can work harder for longer. This may or may not work for you so find your own balance and go with it.

I will post on here the link to the next set of blogs (they are being hosted elsewhere) so you can keep following if you are interested.

Open Days

This week it's all about the open days, and why it's important to attend them. Open days at all universities are an integral part of your choices. This is your opportunity to see the campus, accommodation and ask the questions you need to.

For my open day at the University of Bedfordshire, I went armed with questions. Read about the course (as mentioned in several if the previous blog posts), read reviews, and went with as much knowledge as possible. With this prior knowledge in mind, I was able to ask relevant questions, and clear up any discrepancies I had. I was able to confirm teaching structure, course structure, and most importantly exam structure.

A tour of the campus provided me with a nice overall look at where I would be working for the next few years, as well as some useful pointers for places to study. Along with this, pointers of where the best places for food and drink were also welcomed.

I have not stayed in university accommodation, I have traveled from home each day, so I did not go on the tour. However, my friends who did, said that it was very well presented, and assisted in making their choices.

Next week its all about the balance of study and socializing, and the problems and possible solutions that come with going to university.

How the course is taught

This week I'm delving into the details of my course specifically, as well as an overview of the majority of computing courses. I'm going to talk about the make-up of the course, choices and the lecturers themselves.

All computing courses (apart from a couple specialized like maths) have the exact same first year. You all do the same 4 units, all taught at the same time, together. This means that everyone gets the same level of teaching as a basis to move forward next year. It also means that if during the year you decide that you want to change course because something else looks better than what you were planning on doing, you can. As I'm talking about first year, I would like to clarify something regarding the mythology around the whole "first year doesn't count". Your right, it doesn't count towards your final degree grade. HOWEVER, you must still PASS the year otherwise, congratulations on wasting £9000+ to sit around and do nothing all year. I can't stress enough, make use of your first year, make your mistakes here, ask questions, get to know your lecturers, get to know where help is and how you get it and most importantly, learn how to use BREO (the online course/University management tool).

On the course that I am studying, Computer Security and Forensics, you do not get a choice of modules. I know that on other computing courses this is the same. Do the research, find out what your course is structured like. Not having to choose, at least based on my experience with my brother who had to choose at his university, is actually quite relieving. Yes, you might end up doing a unit you dislike. However, if you had to choose and you wanted to do one unit, then got rejected and had to do a unit you disliked, then it would feel worse. in my experience so far, the units themselves are selected for a reason whether you feel they are relevant or not. My advice, roll with it and if you have any problems bring it up with your course representative, or the lecturer.

On the subject of lecturers, lets talk about them next. In my experience so far, they are all very approachable and willing to listen to your opinions, no matter what they are. If you dont like the unit, what is being taught, you don't understand, whatever the issue is, they are willing to listen. As an example, we had a major issue with one of our units this year, we were expected to have A-level maths knowledge in order to build upon it with engineering based maths. Now, I was the only person in the class who had touched A-level maths, and I failed it. After a couple of lectures of this going completely over our heads, I was asked to go to the head of unit to get it sorted. After several meetings/conversations, we came to the conclusion that the teaching syllabus would change to incorporate some maths lessons, and that subject matter would be adapted to less intense maths. Also for next year, the entire unit would be re-structured to prevent this from happening again. So through talking and conversation with the lecturers, we took what was clearly a problem and turned it into a positive outcome.

I know this weeks blog was longer than normal, so if you stayed till the end then thanks. Next week I'll be talking about open days and how important it is to go armed with certain things.

Ahhh, those were the days...

This week its time to get nostalgic. I look back at my past two years and decide what is my most memorable memory. What I have decided to do, is look back only on the past year and choose from there. The past year for me has seen quite a change, both inside and outside of university life.

So during this year, I have been a PAL leader, a course representative as well as the group project leader in all my projects. All of these were personal achievements for which I am very proud. Outside of University I have become a Pilot Officer RAF VR(T) (Volunteer Reserve Training) within the Air cadet Organisation, and recently taken command of my cadet Squadron. Also, I have discovered that I'm not as bad as I used to be at gaming, though still pretty rubbish in the grand scheme of things. All in all, these things have made it a good year.

However, my number one experience of the year, has to be the opportunity to work with Bedfordshire Police on a "real" case. It was real in a sense that the malicious attack had happened to a real world company, using real world software. Myself, along with four of my friends went to the company and assisted in the removal of the malware, as well as securing it against further attack of this nature. Whilst I cant go into great detail, I can say that it was a very enjoyable and enlightening experience to have an opportunity to work with Bedfordshire Police. The University have a full media article here if you are interested in some more information on this.

This weeks blog is shorter than usual, however next week I'll be talking about how my course is taught, so that will definitely take some more reading.

Choosing your new University

The results are in, you know what you want to study, but the question is where? Do you go and study a subject at a university that you like the name of? Do you find the subject that you desperately want to study but it's at an obscure university on the other side of the planet? The trick is to find the balance.

So to start with, the university itself. My biggest tip would be to do the research on not just the university, but the halls, the local area, the nightlife, the societies, everything and anything that is important to you. Make sure you actually read the 'small print' as it were. Don't just look for the good reviews, look at the not so good ones as well. With a balanced outlook, then you can decide if the university is for you.

But before you can look for universities, you need to find a course that is good for you. Again, there are a few things that you will need to bear in mind. Research, research, research. Do not just pick a course on a whim, nor pick a course because it's at the university you want to go to. Look at the course, is it a sandwich, is it a 3 or 4 year, what the units are, will there be choices, this and many more things relating to any course need to be researched. Do not just pick a course because it sounds fun, speak to people who are already taking it and get the negative points as well. Then, you can make an informed decision.

I picked the University of Bedfordshire to study Computer Security and Forensics for several reasons. I briefly mentioned last week how I came to choose the University and the course. I'll elaborate a bit with a bit more background. I never originally wanted to go to university, I was just going into the world of work. However, because of my A-level grades, I wasn't able to do what I wanted to do. After working in jobs that were rather boring and dead-end, I decided that I was going to go to university. After doing some looking around, I came to the conclusion that I wanted to do Computer Security and Forensics. After looking at several universities, I discovered that no-one apart from the University of Bedfordshire did the course I wanted to do. Several did however do similar courses, but after some research either the units didn't look as good, or the university facilities didn't appeal to me. So it was a combination of all of these that led me to choose my course and university.

Next week I'm going to talk about a reflection of my past year, and some key events that I have found interesting this past year.

Me, myself and I

So for my first blog, I decided that I would talk a bit about me and my course. My name is Scott Dewson, I'm 23 years old and I'm studying Computer Security and Forensics (CSF) for the second year. I am a big gamer (both board and computer) and I am usually terrible at both. The time that's not spent studying or gaming is usually taken up by my role as a Squadron Commander within the Air Cadets.

The course that I'm taking is very relevant to what's happening in the world at the moment. For those of you who aren't up to date with what's going on in cyber security, I'll give you a quick overview. The UK are attacking China, China are attacking North Korea, North Korea are shaking their fists at everyone, Russians are attacking Russia, Russia is also attacking anything that moves, and everyone is attacking the US. Looks like a messed-up war zone don't you think? Well, it is. It may not seem it on the surface, or even publicly, but war is moving from the battle-ground to cyber-space. This is where the CSF students come in. We will eventually move into one of two areas, either the protection (Security) or the investigation (Forensics) sectors. With the protection we will be testing defences, and fixing holes before malicious attackers can exploit them. With investigating, we will be doing a post-mortem on attacks to figure out what happened and how it was conducted. 

So why did I choose this course? Because of how awesome the technology is, how interesting the subject is, and that the future of computing rests completely on the future of this area of study and the people studying it. Without people defending computers from attacks and malicious uses, computers would not be safe to use for anything (not that they're hugely safe now). 

Why the University of Bedfordshire? Because at the time it was the only University to offer a Security and Forensics package. The lecturers and technicians know what they are talking about. Some lecturers have years of experience in teaching the subject, others have industrial experience in the subject, and a couple have both. If you want people who really know what they are doing, then Bedfordshire is the place to go.

And what's the best thing about my University life so far? The people. I know it sounds cliche, but it's definitely the people that make the Uni experience. Not just the friends, but just the people in general. Bedfordshire is a very diverse University both culturally and ethnically, and it's this that makes the best experiences. I have learnt more about different cultures and the food (my god, the food) in my two years at Bedfordshire than in 11 years of Religious studies in school. 

With A-level exams going on now and Year 12's looking towards University choices soon, next week I'm going to talk about choosing the right University. More importantly, the choices that come with picking a University beyond the name.

Graduation and what’s next?

Next week is graduation day and generally the last time I'll see and speak to most of my peers and lecturers. Though I can imagine I’ll keep in contact with a 10 or so, it’s realistically the last time you’ll see everyone together. People move back home in most cases around the country and in some cases back to their home country.  It’s a great opportunity to reminisce and socialise although I personally won’t be attending mine because of costs.

I think this time tells a lot about a student. Speaking to quite a lot of my peers almost all of them haven’t even opened 3Ds Max (Main program we used for uni) and I think it clearly shows those who were actually passionate about the course and their career. At the moment my timetable is 10 hours’ 3Ds Max a day, 6 days a week. I'm planning to give my portfolio a huge boost with my skills in the next few weeks.

I enjoy doing it and sometimes in my assigned breaks I’ll be still working on projects. Though in the meantime I've been accepted to 3 different scholarships at 2 different universities. This means if I decided that industry isn't right for me at the moment then I’ll carry on with education.

I think the perfect job for me would to be working in a small 3D animation studio and I think I'm ready for that. I’ll polish up my portfolio in the next few weeks and be sending it to a certain few companies that’d love to work at.

I think this applies to any computer science course, work on your portfolio. It’s 100% your portfolio that counts. Your degree will only matter when being compared to someone who doesn't have one. 

Is university worth it?

I’d hate to be you right now. No offence, but going to university is a much harder decision now for sixth form/college students who are thinking of applying. The fees are up, competition is hard and scary statistics of graduates not finding jobs.

It’s hard for anyone to find a job at the moment and I’ve recently been researching on companies and how they accept people. They will automatically not hire someone who’s got a perfect CV/portfolio but turns up with a suit on and not wearing a watch… At least having a degree on that CV will at least hopefully tick the box to get the interview in the firs place.  

This is for most aspects of computer science, I’ve seen programming jobs for graduates. With requirements like “Good with C#, Java, C++, AS3, HTML 5, Python, Maxscript, Unity, 3Ds Max, Maya, good word/excel skills and can sketch well”. Now, I’m not a programmer, but it must be frustrating applying for such vague job descriptions. I think it’s probably rare to find anyone who is fluid with all of these languages at graduate stage. Almost every job I’ve seen requires a degree and a good one at that. Though there are routes you can take with internships and personal portfolio building in your own time, I think it’s personally a great idea to get a degree. 

I have yet to graduate, but I’ve already got myself a few interviews. I’m almost certain that I wouldn’t even be considered if I applied for my degree because to be honest it’s the skills you learn and the knowledge you gain which is much more important that the paper work. So now I’ve got a much more impressive portfolio that I had a few years. Of course I could have worked on 3Ds max projects in my own time, but why not both? I’ve done a lot of freelance work while at University including stuff for Microsoft, YouTube and internships.  

If you have a passion for something, you will try in all means to succeed. I personally think getting a career you love is almost winning at life.

Extra classes, events and user groups at university

Now there is plenty of societies and groups that the university hold. Event workshops for CV’s, languages lessons and I think I’ve even seen gaming societies. I’ve attend very interesting guest lectures which aren’t apart of the curriculum but generally everyone attends. It gives you a better insight on how companies work and what to expect when going into industry. We’ve had quite a few of these guest lectures and I’m certain they have them for all aspects in computer science.

I’m attending another gamesJam/hackathon at Cambridge University next week (first weekend of July). Although this isn’t held by the University of Bedfordshire, a team of Bedfordshire students are going up and participating it. In computer science there are more technical user groups dotted all around. For example, there’s specific software user groups, operating system user groups and just general monthly/weekly tech events. Now it’s very difficult to compete with events which are held by in most cases experts or even creators of that software. It’s a place where people go to share ideas, contacts and get expert/peer advice.  

What’s amazing about being a Computer Science student at the moment is there is so much free knowledge and really plenty of events which relate to what you prefer. You may argue that you don’t need to be at university to attend these yes, but it’s amazing to have experts in the field very local/ most probably London.  From the ones I’ve attended everyone is very friendly and probably can answer any burning questions you have. Though I wouldn’t personally ask trivial questions which you can just research yourself and maybe not ask university assignment question answers. Rather techniques/tips to learn more on a specific area. Generally at these user groups there’s presentations that take places for some free extra knowledge!

Below are some links that you may find useful, studying at the University of Bedfordshire it’s a very quick journey to London. So there’s really no excuse to be attending these what mostly are free events. In some cases there’s a digital live steam you can watch if you can’t attend in person. 

Useful related links

List of societies running at Luton Campus

http://www.bedssu.co.uk/main-menu/societies/bedsocs-luton

Search for Microsoft related user groups

www.technicalcommunity.com

Search for Apple related user groups

http://appleusergroupresources.com/find-a-group/

UK Linux User groups 

https://lug.org.uk/

 

Autodesk events, workshops and seminars

http://uk.gep.autodesk-services.com/

Awaiting replies

I’ve been working on my portfolio in the last week. I found myself in a waiting room at hospital (long story, wasn’t for me though) when I thought it’d make a great render. Here’s the progress I’ve made so far.

Hospital draft render

Not finished yet, still need to add a few models/light features but making some good progress. As I spoke about before, there’s nothing I can do but wait. So to try and be somewhat productive I thought creating renders like this in my spare time would be a good thing to do. I’m going to quite a few events next month, would be nice if I get this polished to showcase and ask for critiques. I’ve also had some good topics for researching. If I don’t get accepted to an EngD/PhD course I applied for, I still might work on researching this in my own time. 

I don’t think I spoke about this before, but a subset of my final year project was using vectors for wrinkle maps was published at CGAT conference in Singapore, so I’m now a co-author! I’d love to research some more into other topics.

I’ve also got my final year provision grades! Being A, A, A-, A- but with the 1 unit transfer being A, A, A, A-! Which is a good result overall, so grade wise, I'm definitely on task for a 1:1. Just awaiting replies from university/institutions now.

The people and what to expect

I can’t obviously speak for every computer science course in every university. We’re all a bunch of nerds and geeks, not the cute hipster kind but the kind of nerds and geeks that’d love a discussion about the latest MMO patch updates and want to have a 3 hour discussion about optimizing a piece of code by a tenth of a millisecond. Computer science students are generally stereotyped like this in the media, The Big Bang Theory is originally based on Computer Science Students (programmers) and not physicists, and also it’s based on one of the writer’s real experience as a computer science student.

Now in secondary school, I was much on the nerdier side. I gamed on computers, loved tech and was academically smart.  Though, when I joined university it was like a whole different category and I was rather struck by it. One of the major shockers was day after Bayern vs Chelsea champions league final, as a Chelsea fan I came into class wanting to talk about the game. When I brought up the subject I was greeted to “You watch sports?” Not even narrowing it down to football but general “sports”. It was really strange to get used to and took a while that to know “Which Linux distro do you prefer?” would be a better conversational topic, Whereas before I’d know the inevitable answer would be “What’s linux?”. That being said we had some sports enthusiasts, non-gamers and genuine hipsters. Though everyone got on well with each other. I think I speak for every degree type, you are all there because you have a strong passion for a subject area. This meant you was with a lot of likeminded peers and everyone got on with each other. 

This blog post was inspired by Moss, IT Crowd

Final Year Project VIVA

I had my final year project VIVA last week (oral exam), I thought it would benefit others if I shared my experience. I’m unsure if everyone has one, seemed mainly computer science based course have VIVA’s. A basic overview of what the VIVA is that your project supervisor and you and in a room alone with an external examiner. Then quizzed about your project, it’s also now that you find out how good your idea was. From speaking to others, you get rigorously grilled about your subject choice and technicality of it.

My viva went very well, I think I was less than 5 minutes in the meeting. I answered all questions sufficiently and without blabbering. I think this is mostly because of my topic, my final year project could have been a failure. I picked something that I had knowledge of, but never tried. I basically had to invent my own methodology and without even knowing if it was possible. It definitely had its risk, but my supervisor/examiner seemed very pleased with my work.

I’m unsure legally if I can disclose exact questions, but I can give a rough overview from what I heard from others and what to expect. 

-        -  Understand your project inside out

-        -  Reasoning

o   Know why you worded your so

o   The final methodology and why

o   Does your project benefit anyone?

o   Does this project even fit in this degree area?

o   If you didn’t complete it, then why.

o   What could you do better

o   If you used any plugins, can’t you do it without?

Also be prepared to be quizzed on your own project, a viva is also there to make sure that you did your own project. I’d recommend re-reading your whole final paper again just to refresh the project.

I found a very handy link which has more information about project vivas here http://www.stars.rdg.ac.uk/viva.html