UCL Data Science or Edinburgh Operational Research

Hi all,

I know there are already plenty of these Edinburgh vs UCL discussions on here, yet I still have some specific questions.
I have been accepted for the MSc Data Science (with specialisation in Statistics) at UCL and MSc Operational Research at the University of Edinburgh.

1) Does anybody have any experience with one of the programmes or simply the departments? The programme in Edinburgh is run by the School of Mathematics and the one at UCL by the Statistics Department.
I am equally interested in the two programmes and just want to make sure to receive the best teaching quality and education in the respective subjetcs.

2) Do you have any idea about differences regarding the workload?
Everbody I have talked to from UoE seemed sort of stressed out and had little to no free time. I did not talk to any UCL students though.
I had the chance to visit both cities and while I totally get why people like Edinburgh, I definitely prefer the busy London lifestyle. I am just a bit worried that I won't have any leisure time to appreciate it.

3) I know most people say that prestige should not be a factor and a uni's name won't score me any jobs. However, I do care about that.
I am not aiming for any sort of super high-paid, 60 hours per week job, I just want to be able to work internationally and therefore study at a internationally recognized university.
Another thing about the uni's prestige is the feeling of a "personal accomplishment". If that makes any sense to you ...
So what you think about both universities' reputations regarding the specific programmes?

I have received a full scholarship for UoE, but I also have access to student loans and wouldn't mind borrowing the money to study at UCL.

I would really appreciate your thoughts. Thank you very much!

....

Hi!

I wont be of much help but I think I can give my thoughts on Q3 - as much as ranking/prestige shouldn't be a major deciding factor I understand the whole personal accomplishment side of things. That being said, both universities are internationally renowned (being an international student myself, obviously Oxbridge is up there but so is UCL, Edinburgh, Manchester etc). Although perhaps because UCL is in London, that may give a more prestigious reputation. I am not sure how your department's reputation at each university is though.

I see that it's a taught masters, but is there a big research component to it too? If so perhaps the right university between the two would be the one whose department's work match research interests.

Goodluck! Hope you get more insight from others!

Postgrads don't tend to stick around so you may not get too many responses from previous students. Most people will only have studied at one of the unis so may not be able to help you compare either. The courses sound different so what is important is what it covered and how it will be taught and assessed. The fact that it's delivered by slightly different depts, one of which may be quite specialist is probably important. You may also want to consider what sorts and how many research opportunities you will get. Masters courses are intense no matter where you are and will be vastly different from undergrad so you have to be prepared for that but that's not to say that you won't have time to do other things. It's a question of being organised and managing your time well. And no you won't get a better job simply by going to a specific uni. See where grads end up and which unis and linked with what employers and that will give you an idea of how the unis compare in terms of employability.

Hi all,

I know there are already plenty of these Edinburgh vs UCL discussions on here, yet I still have some specific questions.
I have been accepted for the MSc Data Science (with specialisation in Statistics) at UCL and MSc Operational Research at the University of Edinburgh.

1) Does anybody have any experience with one of the programmes or simply the departments? The programme in Edinburgh is run by the School of Mathematics and the one at UCL by the Statistics Department.
I am equally interested in the two programmes and just want to make sure to receive the best teaching quality and education in the respective subjetcs.

2) Do you have any idea about differences regarding the workload?
Everbody I have talked to from UoE seemed sort of stressed out and had little to no free time. I did not talk to any UCL students though.
I had the chance to visit both cities and while I totally get why people like Edinburgh, I definitely prefer the busy London lifestyle. I am just a bit worried that I won't have any leisure time to appreciate it.

3) I know most people say that prestige should not be a factor and a uni's name won't score me any jobs. However, I do care about that.
I am not aiming for any sort of super high-paid, 60 hours per week job, I just want to be able to work internationally and therefore study at a internationally recognized university.
Another thing about the uni's prestige is the feeling of a "personal accomplishment". If that makes any sense to you ...
So what you think about both universities' reputations regarding the specific programmes?

I have received a full scholarship for UoE, but I also have access to student loans and wouldn't mind borrowing the money to study at UCL.

I would really appreciate your thoughts. Thank you very much!

Hello,
May I ask your background?
Cause Data Science and Operational Research are not that similar, and I am just curious about your background and interesting.

hello,
I just finished my Bachelor's degree in Mathematics. So I have taken a fair number of OR and optimization related classes, but also took some modules in statistics, numerical linear algebra and learned some R programming

Anybody else?
I am particularly wondering whether the 12000 GBP less and having a Scholarship on my CV will make up for the slightly worse reputation of UoE compared to UCL?

If I was you I'd go for UCL
Where'd you get your maths bachelors from?