Which university is better for computer science? Pt.2

Ive made a similar thread before however I just wanted to be completely sure with my choice. At the moment my firm choice is surrey uni and insurance choice is portsmouth uni. I was completely sure on firming surrey but I saw the new rank lists on websites for 2019-2020 comp sc universities and surrey has gone down a lot, while portsmouth has gone up. Throughout the years this has been happening a lot. Now I'm worried that surrey might end up going way way down by the time I've graduated and Portsmouth may go really up. Anyone has any information on why this is happening? And literally any advice on which uni I should choose as my final firm choice is accepted and greatly appreciated.

Reply 1

LuigiMario

19

I wouldn't worry about short term changes in perceived ranking, after all Guardian just allegedly dumped Oxford down to no.3 in UK in favour of St. Andrews for their 2019/2020 rankings.

For Surrey, I think the fact that your putative future college was one of the few that participated in and received the prestigious TEF "Gold" quality teaching award at its inception in 2017 is a great positive https://www.surrey.ac.uk/features/gold-award-marks-university-surrey-outstanding-institution

Shockingly, it also doesn't *really* matter where you do it and what your first degree is in - long experience here with students from all over the world, if you work hard at excellent Surrey or Portsmouth, get a good first degree then do a year's MSc at Glasgow or Stockholm, ÉPFL or ETHZ, you'd likely be better placed than those who attended Oxbridge.

Reply 2

Sunnn56

OP

5

So what you are saying is that it doesnt really matter where I go? I've heard some not so good things about portsmouth but I kinda like it tbh, and one of my friends is going there.

Original post by LuigiMario

I wouldn't worry about short term changes in perceived ranking, after all Guardian just allegedly dumped Oxford down to no.3 in UK in favour of St. Andrews for their 2019/2020 rankings.

For Surrey, I think the fact that your putative future college was one of the few that participated in and received the prestigious TEF "Gold" quality teaching award at its inception in 2017 is a great positive https://www.surrey.ac.uk/features/gold-award-marks-university-surrey-outstanding-institution

Shockingly, it also doesn't *really* matter where you do it and what your first degree is in - long experience here with students from all over the world, if you work hard at excellent Surrey or Portsmouth, get a good first degree then do a year's MSc at Glasgow or Stockholm, ÉPFL or ETHZ, you'd likely be better placed than those who attended Oxbridge.

Reply 3

LuigiMario

19

It is (in practice) a great idea to choose, to the best of your abilities, the undergraduate uni that most meets all of your requirements

however, I have a friend who knew he wanted to be an computerist/engineer, he recently got into the (seriously, just) £500 fees per year prestigious École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland, and discovered after a while that he didn't actually like engineering that much! Plus the Swiss were a bit reserved and no-one spoke to him for his year there.

He then ended up the next September at Leeds University, doing his hobby (he'd slowly been learning Japanese for a few years) and had a great time professionally learning Japanese at a bog-standard large impressive British University. Now to complicate matters, he's at his THIRD "first" university in the last three years as the course at Leeds (inevitably) required students to spend their year two in Asia. Which has been great (fees just £3k/year with some contained/subsidised accom costs from the Japanese)

Now he'll be restarting at Leeds (probably) for their year three (out of four) and when he's finished he might do a Masters in something, somewhere

Critically, The Masters degree is where it is highly important that you choose exactly the right subject and the right place, as in most employment considerations post-education, this is where the HR department will focus most attention, not necessarily on the complicated-or-not route to get up to undergraduate. I further base these comments on noticing that many serious jobs in EU/US and increasingly in UK, look for the appropriate MSc qualification, and occasionally a doctorate. Quite a few of my computing colleagues have completed a Master at places such as politechnico Milan, Italy or in Northern Spain, some have completed their Doctorate at Stockholm, or Karlsruhe, or again Spain. These are the computing jobs that pay in the £100K p.a. range.

My two friend who are *illionaires, went to respectively "Edinburgh" then Insead MBA, or just Cambridge. Tho my mate TimBL went to the Queens College, Oxford - he might also qualify as having done rather well.

There's no reason on earth why you can't achieve that which you wish, starting at either Surrey or Portsmouth. You might have to do further learning elsewhere, which you will inevitably discover as you see where your interests naturally take you. Have fun!