Competition - post a photo you've taken of nature >>

UK and Europe...Which one is harder

chun402

I want to ask which place will have more study pressure in engineering subject???

Reply 1

Omg!Rly?

Top unis in UK. (reseach based)

They aren't top for no reason lol

Imperial is 5th in the world ATM

Reply 2

MizzCupcakes

It depends on every university more than anything else I think, if we're still talking about study pressure.. You'll have more pressure if u study engineering in a different language, which u'll most likely do if it's somehwere else. and they probably don't have the same system and what they teach etc. Engineering isn't that universal so that you'll be studying the same thing in every country or even uni...

Reply 3

dadude

The times rankings is to be taken with a pinch of salt. I am studying in the engineering college of lausanne in switzerland, and coming from England, i can tell you we do ALOT more work than the majority of british students. Id say it and eth zurich come just after cambridge and imperial but that doesnt necessarily mean people do less work.

Then in france its a completely different system with les ecoles prepas which are notoriously extremely difficult so again id say way harder than any uk uni and i know what im talkin about. Its basically 2 years of hell and theres not time for socialising/partyin or whatever. Although the workload decreases after that.

Reply 4

adam0311

Original post by dadude

So rankings should be based on quantity of work?

Reply 5

Nathanielle

@chun 402:
Study pressure? Depends on the student, by which factors theit are put under pressure.

More important: Europe isn't a country. Actually the UK is only a part of Europe and most of the other states in Europe haven't more in common, than the UK has with any other European state. Thus your question can't be answered.

So to make it possible to tell you about studying Engineering in another European country: Which countries your interested in? Or even better: Universities?

(edited 13 years ago)

Reply 6

Krov

France's engineering schools are the hardest.
Don't go there :frown:

Reply 7

dadude

Original post by adam0311

So rankings should be based on quantity of work?

well if you cover a larger quantity of material then yes it should be one of the criteria. The rankings are based mainly on publications and doesnt take into consideration the quality of teaching, the different curriculas etc. For french schools they are no where to be seen in the rankings because they have different ecoles for each department so the publications are spread over several ecoles.

Reply 8

chun402

Original post by Nathanielle

I am quite interested in switzerland, but I want to know more about other countries in europe.

Maybe the study pressure I mean is the workload or the difficulty of exam etc.

Reply 9

Nathanielle

1st France: Prépa and Concours pour entrer aux Grandes Ecoles

Germany and Switzerland first two years less harder than in France, but you have other difficulities at the big and ""prestigiuos" Universitiesand if you want to get top grades and can be very very hard.

After the first two years it can be less hard in France than in Germany/Switzerland (It is very difficult to generalize because there are so much different Ecoles and Universities.)

Austria is more student friendly (e.g. you can often choose at which time of the year you want to write the exam)

The others: I don't know, but I think Netherlands is also quite nice to study and perhaps less harder, but I only rely one or two statements

Reply 10

chun402

Original post by Nathanielle

So do u mean UK is the most relaxing one compare to countries in europe :confused:

Reply 11

manchild007

There's only one way to find out........FIGHT!

Reply 12

Nathanielle

@Chun402
Well, I didn't mention the UK, because you know probably more about it, but from what I know France should be way harder in the first two years, as you need top grades in Bac to be even admitted to prepare two years for passing the entrance examination.
I don't think that the top UK Universities are harder as other top Europe Universities, but I definitly not think it is relaxing (okay, except the easier Universities, but this spreading you have in every country, look at e.g. German Polytechnics compared to German Universities, French Universities to Grandes Ecoles, ...) to study in the UK.

Reply 13

rahxephon

It's not a question ! France is the harder country in undergrad ! The only reason you don't see Ecole Polytechnique or Ecole Normale Supérieure Ulm-Cachan is their size, less than 4000 students. But even with it, check how many fields medals have they produced.
After, it became far hardless ! A 1st year student at Polytechnique is better than a 3st year student at Oxbridge or Harvard, seriously

Reply 14

Nathanielle

Original post by rahxephon

To stay fair, you should compare a 1st year Polytechnicien with a third year Oxbridge and a fourth year MIT student, as Harvard isn't the place to study Engineering, from what I've heard.
But the two years before getting into X are the hardest I suppose. So perhaps better compare:
1st and 2nd year Oxbridge, 1st to 3rd year MIT with Henry IV, Sainte-Geneviève, Stanislas, Louis-le-Grand etc.

Reply 15

rahxephon

Nop, to stay fair we have to compare a 1st year Polytechnique student with a 4year MIT student or a 3rd year Cambridge student, but not with a Prepa student, because, being in Classe préparatoire doesn't mean that you'll succeed in entering Polytechnique. We have to compare a student who was able to meet entry requirement of Polytechnique ( even if every prepa student is a very good student ).

Enter in a Grande Ecole is easier by studying abroad in a Top UK/US uni and then came back to France ( that's what I want to do ) than to do a Classe prepa.

Reply 16

Nathanielle

Will they even consider you? At least Polytechnique won't and I don't think it is worth to the "same" degree twice.

My point is, that the harder time of a Polytechnicien is at a Prepa, and as the original question was, where is it the hardest. So I think, if you ask a Polytechnicien, he will say it was harder during Prepa.

Reply 17

StarsAreFixed

Original post by chun402

I am quite interested in switzerland, but I want to know more about other countries in europe.

Maybe the study pressure I mean is the workload or the difficulty of exam etc.

I don't see the point in wanting the 'hardest' degree, it might not come across on a CV as any different from another one. If you are deciding on a university by this, you should be looking at the prestige of the course and the prestige of the university, and rankings play a major part in this. My university is Trinity College Dublin, it is the ONLY Irish university in the top 50 in the world...the second one is miles behind and only 3 universities here feature at all (though we only have 7). Trinity has amazing prestige and is THE university known best internationally and is the first university you're going to think about when you think of Ireland. Trinity graduates are seen as having better degrees than other graduates here, even though that may not be the case. Prestige is everything if you want to be 'seen' to have a better degree. Placing extreme work on yourself if it's going to viewed the same in the end as someone who did the same course with much less of a workload seems stupid to me.

Reply 18

dadude

Well all the big bosses of french companies and industries come out of polytechnique whereas in switzerland a degree from ethz or epfl and youll have companies chasing after you. The rankings according to most europeans say theyre biased in favour of british and american universities yet at the end of the day its not too important since companies know exactly the value of each type of student. The average starting salary from polytechnique in switzerland is 70 000 francs, about 40 000 pounds so almost double what it is for a cambridge graduate