Robotics

Discussion and advice on University Education

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ToadMum
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Joined: Wed Jan 18, 2012 12:41 pm
Location: Essex

Re: Robotics

Post by ToadMum »

One of the differences in practical terms is that for an integrated Masters, both the tuition fee and the maintenance loan can be taken out - it's just a four / five year loan instead of a three / four year one (depending on whether you do a year in industry / year abroad as part of the course). The Masters loan is a fixed amount, no extra available for rent, food, transport etc.
Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.Groucho Marx
2childmum
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Location: S E London

Re: Robotics

Post by 2childmum »

I remember a conversation with the mother of someone tossing up between an integrated masters and a BSc followed by a separate masters. She told me that if her son did a separate masters and took out a loan for it he would have to pay it back alongside his undergraduate loan, whereas the loan for the integrated masters is just an extension of the undergrad loan. Does anyone know if this is true?

DS applied for the integrated masters initially, for a physics degree, based on the idea that if he didn't want to do the 4th year he could drop back to the 3 year BSc, but it would be harder to get the loan for the 4th year integrated masters if he hadn't applied for it right at the beginning. He thought that, if he had wanted to specialise in something for which he would need a specialist masters, he could decide that at a later date. As it happens he is going onto the integrated masters year next year, as he is specialising in astronomy and there was a long list of research projects in that area available for his final year (plus he has an internship this summer at the European Southern Observatory headquarters)

Things may be a little different for engineering, though, especially is someone wants to specialise in something really specific
salsa
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Joined: Tue Sep 03, 2013 10:59 am

Re: Robotics

Post by salsa »

Thank you all. I really didn’t think about the practicalities, but I do notice that most of the degrees my son is looking at are 4 years.
Hopefully we can ask these questions at the open days.

Salsa
ToadMum
Posts: 11947
Joined: Wed Jan 18, 2012 12:41 pm
Location: Essex

Re: Robotics

Post by ToadMum »

2childmum wrote:I remember a conversation with the mother of someone tossing up between an integrated masters and a BSc followed by a separate masters. She told me that if her son did a separate masters and took out a loan for it he would have to pay it back alongside his undergraduate loan, whereas the loan for the integrated masters is just an extension of the undergrad loan. Does anyone know if this is true?

Yes, it is - as I mentioned in the post above :) . The 'integrated' Masters is an 'undergraduate Masters'. And yes, the usual advice is that SFE or the NI / Scottish / Welsh equivalent prefer you to start with the longer course and drop back if necessary - but obviously, the other way round isn't impossible, or no-one would ever manage it
Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.Groucho Marx
Tinkers
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Joined: Mon May 16, 2011 2:05 pm
Location: Reading

Re: Robotics

Post by Tinkers »

A number of MEng courses (and BEng too) have options allowing some specialisation. My own MEng course 25+ years ago in the very early days of MEng degrees being offered certainly did. It’s worth looking to see what’s available.

In my case it was definitely recommended to start with the MEng and if you wanted to later ‘change down’, but that was with the old grants system. I’m not sure how it works now. Also back then most engineering students did BEng, not many did MEng as it wasn’t required to get chartered then. Out of about 60/70 of us, only 8 in my year did the MEng.
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