Imperial vs. UCL vs. Edinburgh for undergraduate computer science

This poll is closed

Which university should he choose?

Imperial College London 64%

UCL 27%

Edinburgh9%

Total votes: 11

londoncricket

17

Hi all,

One of my friends has got unconditional offers for the above course at Imperial, UCL and Edinburgh. He asked me to ask around for advice as to which one he should take. I thought I'd get the TSR opinion on this...

Reply 1

Snufkin

Universities Forum Helper

21

I would tell him to look at the course structure/module options and choose the degree which best matches his interests.

Reply 2

RandomAccount

4

,,

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 3

Snufkin

Universities Forum Helper

21

Original post by RandomAccount

How do I differentiate between course structure? They all look the same to me lmao

I'm choosing between Southampton, Edinburgh and Warwick

heres southampton
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/programmes/bsc-computer-science#modules

heres edinburruhh
http://www.ed.ac.uk/studying/undergraduate/degrees/index.php?action=view&code=G400

This is the link for Edinburgh:
http://www.drps.ed.ac.uk/16-17/dpt/utcmpsi.htm

There is quite a big difference in terms of degree structure. In the first year of Edinburgh's degree you spend a third of your time studying outside subjects, whereas at Southampton you just study computer science. As for modules... you just need to read the list of compulsory and optional modules for each degree and ask yourself, which do I prefer?

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 4

Jabberjay_

11

He'd be crazy not to choose imperial.

Reply 5

username1050473

14

I'm rather unbiased and I'd choose UCL

Reply 6

tmarcod

4

PhD here, I teach and cooperate with both schools.

- Looking for fun, 'easy paper', and girls? Go to UCL.
- Want to work hard, do something outstanding, looking for excellence, prestige? Go to Imperial College.

- UCL is an overrated playground. This is 100% truth confirmed by many UCL employers.
- Imperial (and ETH Zurich) would be my only choice.

Reply 7

Reality Check

22

Original post by tmarcod

PhD here, I teach and cooperate with both schools.

- Looking for fun, 'easy paper', and girls? Go to UCL.
- Want to work hard, do something outstanding, looking for excellence, prestige? Go to Imperial College.

- UCL is an overrated playground. This is 100% truth confirmed by many UCL employers.
- Imperial (and ETH Zurich) would be my only choice.

Clearly you don't "teach and coöperate with both schools", or you wouldn't be calling UCL an 'overrated playground'... Only the unsophisticated could make such sweeping and baseless claims.

Is this the view of many American students regarding UCL?

Reply 8

artful_lounger

Universities Forum Helper

21

Original post by londoncricket

Hi all,

One of my friends has got unconditional offers for the above course at Imperial, UCL and Edinburgh. He asked me to ask around for advice as to which one he should take. I thought I'd get the TSR opinion on this...

In general, Imperial is the strongest of the 3, followed by Edinburgh then slightly more distantly, UCL for purely academic considerations. UCLs course is more application focused, with many applied areas of CS offered as options throughout (such as web development and cybersecurity for example). Imperial would be heavily weighted to the theoretical and mathematical aspects in the early years, although they do have a strong base in AI and machine learning, computer graphics and vision, as well as various modelling/data based things (finance, bioinformatics, scientific computing). Edinburgh I'm less familiar with specifically but I am aware it has a strong prestige and historical background in the subject area.

Original post by RandomAccount

How do I differentiate between course structure? They all look the same to me lmao

I'm choosing between Southampton, Edinburgh and Warwick

heres southampton
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/programmes/bsc-computer-science#modules

heres edinburruhh
http://www.ed.ac.uk/studying/undergraduate/degrees/index.php?action=view&code=G400

Similar to my previous comment, Warwick is more weighted to the theoretical/mathematical elements early on. They have a strong research base in data science as well as discrete mathematics/theoretical computer science. I imagine there are some financial computing opportunities as well. Southampton has a broad area of expertise, and a long history of excellence in it's computer science (and electrical/electronic engineering, as the department is joint between the two) department. They have a variety of options spanning machine learning and AI, graphics and vision, cybersecurity, theoretical computer science, web development, games development (an unusual opportunity at an "academic" uni), as well as many "low/machine level" options in computer architecture, operating systems and similar in conjunction with the EE half of the department. They also have a lot of optoelectronics reserach in tandem with physics, some actuarial science/financial modelling with the maths/business departments, and you could probably leverage it to go into SOES for postgrad in a computationally oriented topic.

Reply 9

Snufkin

Universities Forum Helper

21

Original post by tmarcod

PhD here, I teach and cooperate with both schools.

- Looking for fun, 'easy paper', and girls? Go to UCL.
- Want to work hard, do something outstanding, looking for excellence, prestige? Go to Imperial College.

- UCL is an overrated playground. This is 100% truth confirmed by many UCL employers.
- Imperial (and ETH Zurich) would be my only choice.

You bumped a year old thread just to bash UCL?

Reply 10

M.Amin1

6

I am a computer science student Your question easy Imperial is the best for computer science.

Original post by londoncricket

Hi all,

One of my friends has got unconditional offers for the above course at Imperial, UCL and Edinburgh. He asked me to ask around for advice as to which one he should take. I thought I'd get the TSR opinion on this...