Writing up a LinkedIn page. I have been writing a few notes for my BSc dissertation (CS) but it is not all that easy to find the motivation, given that it is due in May. I want to have made enough progress to impress any schools I apply to for Master's programmes. Getting into a good school for my MSc is pretty much the priority for me. I am sort of excited about going back to university this September.
Is it really that hard to get into a master program in the UK? In the Netherlands you just need to have the appropriate BSc degree.
No, it's not that hard but I want to apply somewhere other than my current university which may or may not have stricter entry requirements. So I feel like I have to do a little extra to look good to the admissions departments. Also, I hope it will encourage me to start my project earlier.
Ah, ok. I was wondering since a friend of mine who studied in the UK for a semester told me that higher education there does not have the same distinction as the in the Netherlands. Here we have so called "Hogeschool", ofer translated as University of applied science, and "Universiteit", which litterally means university. People coming from a hogeschool cannot enter university (and thus master programs) without doing additional coursework. So, I thought since you lack a distinction for the bachelor, it might be harder to enter master programs. Anyway, good luck with the dissertation (I know your pain, just finished it myself) and finding the appropriate school. Maybe look abroad? I hear that Dutch universities are quite liked with students from the UK at the moment :P
We used to have something like Hogeschool, they were called Polytechnics but they were all converted to universities in 1992. There are a few technical colleges around but I think they're something else again. It's complicated. Thanks for the good luck. What was your dissertation about? Mine involves natural language processing, trying to find a method of determining what language a given piece of text is in. I am looking forward to getting stuck in on it, basically the field is a combination of machine learning, linguistics (in moderation) and dealing with large sets of data. I have considered looking at Continental Europe, the fact that they don't charge astronomical tuition fees is a real advantage (universities in the UK can charge up to £10,000 for a one year MSc)! Are there any in the Netherlands that you could recommend? I have a friend who is doing a gap year at the University of Amsterdam so I think I will ask her to show me around the campus and the city when I visit. I studied German at secondary school and I am planning to do an evening class this year so there is a real possibility of me moving to Germany to do my MSc. Hell, the more I think about it the dumber the idea of studying in England seems...
My dissertation was about the building and optimally controlling an energy management system. I don't know how much you know about electronics, but there was a triple active bridge (a device which enables you to force energy in towards an output point) at the heart of the system, a solar panel as a source, battery as buffer and a fridge as the sink. This had to be controlled optimally, but I spend a great deal of time on figuring out what optimal meant in this context. Long live engineering. If you are looking at something in information science, you might want to consider Utrecht University. It is the second largest university in the Netherlands. Leiden is also quite good I hear (top university here according to Elsevier). If you are looking for a more technical/low level approach you can also look at Eindhoven or Delft. Both have technical universities and thus focus more on the low level stuff. Be warned though, in Delft the people from building engineering burned down their own building a while ago :P 10.000 pound is a LOT. And I'm complaining about 3.500 euro...
It's a stupid amount of money, really. There was a fucking massive protest in London when undergraduate fees were increased from £3,000 per year to £9,000. Typical Tory twattery. Can't wait til 2015. Those universities look pretty good. I'll have a closer look at them. The more I think about university in the UK the worse an idea it seems.
Wow, they raised the fees that much in one year? Insane. If you want some more information about anything, feel free to ask and good luck.