Computer science degree question

So I'm considering applying to study computer science next year with the grades BBB. Two universities I've looked at that will accept these grades are Cardiff and Swansea. My first question is this: Cardiff is Russell group, but Swansea isn't. Would there be much advantage regarding employability to choose Cardiff over Swansea?
My second question: Swansea offers a 4 year- course with a placement year in industry, but Cardiff doesn't- would this be a big benefit to employability, despite it not being a Russell group university? Thanks

I can say about the placement part.. purely from quotes from where I’m hoping to go and an employment agency etc... the placement year is very valuable.. something like 90% of people will be hired straight after university into a job with computer science compared to a really low amount of you don’t do a placement

So I'm considering applying to study computer science next year with the grades BBB. Two universities I've looked at that will accept these grades are Cardiff and Swansea. My first question is this: Cardiff is Russell group, but Swansea isn't. Would there be much advantage regarding employability to choose Cardiff over Swansea?
My second question: Swansea offers a 4 year- course with a placement year in industry, but Cardiff doesn't- would this be a big benefit to employability, despite it not being a Russell group university? Thanks

Placement year is indeed extremely valuable, and will massively improve your chances of landing a grad job afterwards since you'll have a year's worth of professional experiences.

Other than that, there's hardly any differences between Swansea and Cardiff for Comp Sci. The comp sci department in Swansea is very well funded, and the new building has really nice facilities (e.g. research room for 3rd year and master students). You won't be put at a disadvantages from going Swansea whatsoever just because its not an RG uni (many employers really don't care). Though, RG uni tend to have a more reputable companies visiting the campus than non RG, but you will not be guaranteed a job purely by going to an RG uni.

Have you visited both the campuses?

I've heard great things from some of our residents about Computer Science at Swansea Uni. I believe they are a Top 10 University in the UK for this area. To be honest, it'll be you that sells yourself to an employer not the university you studied at.

Choose whichever uni you think you'll enjoy being/studying at more

Cardiff also has masters but you just have to apply again as a post graduate degree, that is what I am doing anyway. Cause I don't want to stay home so i'm moving out, they are both great universities.

Oh okay cool. Shame they don't offer a placement year as far as I know.

yes they do, my course is has one for CS
https://www.cardiff.ac.uk/study/undergraduate/courses/2020/computer-science-with-a-year-in-industry-bsc

I just finished my first year studying Computer Science at Swansea. I had the same decision as you this time last year having offers from both Swansea and Cardiff. I don’t regret my decision, the reason Cardiff is so popular and has high grade entry requirements is because it’s the capital of Wales so they have a lot of applications. In terms of Cardiff being a RG, I don’t think that’d affect employment at all really, if anything Swansea is a higher ranked uni so still viewed better university. As for the year in industry, I think that just depends if you’d be up for doing that, it is a good opportunity though because they usually tend to offer you a job afterwards. Swansea also offers a year abroad as well if you’re interested in that. Can always chose if you want to either one after year one as well though but there’s many more opportunities at Swansea. The head of computer science is currently working close with Google and getting multiple students internships there. It’s probably worth visiting both Universities if you have the chance though, you can usually tell which one is best for you when you’re there. If you have any other questions about anything at all, feel free to message me😌

Thanks for your post! Please could you share what you like / don't like about the course at Swansea? Are the lecturers helpful? Is the course very difficult?

I like everything about the course, there are some parts which can be a bit of a pain like needing to complete labs every week which can take up a lot of the week but in the end it does help you learn a lot more. The lecturers are sooo helpful! They are always there at the end of lectures to help you with any questions, and you can always email them and receive a quick response too. I struggled with one of my assignments last semester and me and my lecturer had like a 2 hour conversation over email back and fourth with him trying to help, in the end I was able to go to his office to see him and the problem was sorted straight away. They are always there to help. There’s also a discussion board where you can post questions anonymously for every module if you don’t want to ask in class, over email or in their office hours. As for the course being difficult, it depends on what you already know but I know a lot of people who’ve never done computer science before and have got firsts in everything so far, it just depends on how hard you’re willing to work. If you want to get head start, I’d definitely recommend learning a bit of java before you start (if you don’t know some already), you should find the course pretty easy then

Thanks for replying! That sounds really good. And I've actually been learning java recently haha! Don't want to go too far into it though as some people say you might pick up bad habits.

Most people pick up tonnes of bad habits at university anyway, and lecturers don't tend to push students very hard on anything aside from really basic stuff like naming (i.e. things which are quick and easy to point out and explain). So some of that is unavoidable, and also depends a lot on the kinds of books and resources you're learning from (e.g. old books and websites which pre-date the recent versions of Java may use some outdated coding styles)

There's a decent Java style guide here if you'd like a reference for trying to avoid some of the most common habits: https://petroware.no/javastyle.html

If you use JetBrains IntelliJ Community Edition to write Java, then the default settings used by IntelliJ are pretty good and will automatically take care of a lot of this stuff for you if you let it use the auto-formatter and auto-complete. Other times it will show you suggestions for ways you could change the code and a mouseover 'popup' menu option which changes it for you.

Otherwise, people have written entire books on good/bad ways of programming, you're not going to get all of it when you're just starting out, no matter where you're learning from; some of it probably won't really be driven home until you're working in a job with more experienced programmers reviewing your code.