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

What to expect in University Interviews

What to expect

Understand why you are there. They are making sure that you’re firstly academically capable of undertaking the course and if the course is right for you. It’s somewhat like a job interview, it's for the benefit of both parties.

An example of this for me was at one of the universities I visited, if I didn’t have an interview I might have taken this course without releasing exactly what I was getting into. I had an interview with a very kind women who was quizzing me on what I had done in the field and what I want to do. Then she led by telling me about that universities course which was actually different to what the prospectus and website said. I recited what I remember from the website and prospectus just to confirm when she replied with “Yeah, we need to update that.” This is a good example of when an interview benefited me. Otherwise I would have been on a course I didn’t even sign up for, but when there’s a lot of money and time involved it’s actually a huge issue.

That being said, the women did say I was welcome onto the course if I wanted to but after discussing how the course had changed I personally didn’t want to join. That being said, universities have to narrow down applicants so you do need to sell your skills and experience well. It’s not impressive if you are joining a course and have no prior knowledge what so ever. 

Plus all normal interview etiquette apply usually. Gum, clothes manners that normal stuff. Another instance of almost the opposite happening was as mentioned before, I’ve had an exam & interview at one of the universities, this experience was rather nerve-racking. Every other student that was there help an A1-A2 leather folder and there was me… Well, I had a tiny laptop. It was an animation course with both drawing and 3D design. I managed to ace the small exam and interview but I was odd one out. If I could recommend anything it would be prepare. Bring stuff that they might be interested in. For me, I took a video portfolio with me and some stills. But they was interested in some of the specific animations on my portfolio and wanted to see more. Luckily I have a YouTube channel ;) and a website in which I had everything on at the time.