Imperial College London charge £28,000 for their online MSc degree on Coursera

https://www.coursera.org/degrees/msc-machine-learning-imperial

by druml • 7 years ago

32 54 7 years ago

coursera.org

jppope• 7 years ago

British people are funny.

azinman2• 7 years ago

Guess they want you to take this seriously!

theriddlr2• 7 years ago

My INTERNATIONAL FEES for my MSc in Bristol was in 2013 only cost £ 17k. This includes lots of face-to-face contact with lecturers who are research leaders in the field. With living expenses the total would only be £ 30k. Inflation makes the total closer to £ 40k today.

However, for £ 28k, Europeans can study at Imperial in-person and live (albeit on a budget) in London.

rvz3• 7 years ago

   What you get:
    Imperial College branded online MSc degree.
   What you need:
    At least a GPA of 3.9 and £28k+.

So, One year for a online masters at £28k also requiring a three year BSc degree at £25k of debt sounds like your really getting your money's worth. /s

(This is £14k more expensive than a normal masters degree at Imperial)

sweezyjeezy2• 7 years ago

It's 14k more expensive for a normal degree for UK and EU students. It's cheaper for overseas students (normal price £33k), which presumably who this is aimed at.

hogFeast3• 7 years ago

You can do this MSc elsewhere for way less than £14k. Is that place Imperial? No. Is that a name brand uni that someone from HR will know? No. But there are lots of good engineering-focused schools in the UK that are known within industry and that charge closer to £7k (and you don't have to live in London).

EDIT: just saw is £28k over two years, the absolute most expensive courses in the UK are £28k over ONE year. This is crazy (Imperial is known for this kind of money grubbing).

mythrwy• 7 years ago

3.9 GPA sounds pretty restrictive as well for online program.

University of Colorado has an interesting approach to this for Data Science MSc. A series of placement tests rather than GPA.

https://www.coursera.org/degrees/master-of-science-data-scie...

arcturus17• 7 years ago

Where does it say GPA of 3.9? All I've found is 2:1 for UK universities and anywhere between 3-3.5 for US. Also they say it won't say it's online.

rvz3• 7 years ago

They don't need to say it, but because they said the 'minimum' is a 2:1 / 3 GPA it doesn't mean that you will be considered for an interview. If too many people basically applied with the minimum at Imperial, they will just select those with the higher results.

On the safe side, I intentionally said '3.9' GPA / high 1st because it totally beats their requirement of a 2:1 which the competition will try to match. If anyone is seriously considering this university, they should instead get a 3.9 GPA, not a 3 or 2:1.

blakesterz• 7 years ago

That's about $36,000 US. Honest question... is that crazy expensive? How does it compare to other online and on campus programs? I'm guessing it's HIGH?

WrtCdEvrydy• 7 years ago

Nova Southeastern University has an online Masters in Cybersecurity and Info Assurance for $27,500 ($2,700 x 10 classes). They consider one class = 10 hours a week. It's the one I'm doing now.

theriddlr2• 7 years ago

That's the same as international student fees. UK/EU fees are about half that. Salaries in Europe are lower too. £ 28k is around the median household income in the UK or graduate-level salary outside of London. https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/personal...

soneil• 7 years ago

That's the same as international student fees.

I'd assume that's who it's aimed at - GCN/SEA. All of the prestige for all of the cost, with zero the movement.

mettamage2• 7 years ago

In The Netherlands fees are about $12k, so yea. You can do the same thing in Amsterdam, and live here.

It's still one of the reasons why I'm dreaming of starting up a coding school at Dutch prices and market it to US citizens.

If anyone is interested in starting this with me, let me know! I'm Dutch, if you're American and know the market, we might make an interesting team. I taught at the New York Code + Design Academy as a bootcamp instructor in Amsterdam before (some US citizens came here because it was cheaper).

skrebbel• 7 years ago

It's cheaper in NL because the government subsidizes universities. How would your private coding bootcamp get that subsidy?

commandlinefan• 7 years ago

I did an MSCS in the US about 10 years ago - I don’t remember what it actually cost because my employer paid for it, but I do remember that there was a $5000/year cap on tuition reimbursement and I never got close to that.

nexus6mike• 7 years ago

Yes, that is high. Georgia Tech offers an Online M.S. in Computer Science for about $7K USD. [1] Graduates are also conferred the same exact degree as on-campus students. Anecdotally, current and former students seem to like this program. (Source: r/OMSCS, old HN threads.)

University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign also offers an Online Master of Computer Science. This one costs $21,440. [2]

I haven't gone through either program so I can't personally vouch for quality. However, as an outside observer, GA Tech in particular seems to be high relative to the dollar cost.

If you wish to earn an online degree in computer science for credentialing purposes, the 'prestige' conferred by Imperial seems to be much more expensive, relatively, than that earned from GATech or UIUC. [3]

[1] http://www.omscs.gatech.edu/

[2] https://cs.illinois.edu/academics/graduate/professional-mcs-...

[3] https://www.usnews.com/education/best-global-universities/co...

Re: #3: The order of these rankings seems incorrect to me but they should provide directional guidance. TL;DR: GATech #17, Imperial #36, UIUC #57.

USA rankings are: UIUC #5, GATech #8 -- see here: https://www.usnews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-science-sch....

sct202• 7 years ago

In America that's not out of line for an online masters program from a well ranked college. Northwestern has a similar online program for $55k.

rvz3• 7 years ago

It is still beyond expensive. Especially at somewhere like Imperial. First you need to get a BSc degree = $28k+ Then you need to fork an extra $36,000 (USD) £28,000 (GBP) for the online masters which you are paying for the University brand and course. Question is, Is it still worth it?

Apart from the obvious debt. The other Cons? loss of networking opportunities, $14k more expensive, small risk of inferiority to a normal degree. But I guess for some with deep pockets, if the University isn't ranked highly in the world or 'Ivy League' or 'Golden Triangle' then for that price? It is not even worth considering.

hogFeast3• 7 years ago

In the UK, it is steep. Even a relatively expensive, well-known AI MSc will usually set you back at £14k over 2 years (i.e £7k/year)...this is double.

Maybe this reflects that most employers really have no idea what they are doing and how to evaluate whether a degree from somewhere else is worth the same (afaik, Imperial just teach the same stuff as everyone else).

siliconunit• 7 years ago

rip off Britain... nothing new

zerr• 7 years ago

One thing to note - if you're interested only in pedigree - nobody gives a sh*t about Coursera, Udacity, edX or similar "online" labeled stuff.

bonoboTP5• 7 years ago

An important quote from the FAQ:

Will my diploma state that I was in an online programme?
No, your diploma will not state that this is an online degree.

Personally, I find this practice quite questionable and deceptive.

skocznymroczny• 7 years ago

While I also find it questional, perhaps it will lessen the effect of a degree. In the end, you shouldn't need a degree if you have the skills. Nowadays, it can be hard for self-taught developers to get in the industry, just because they don't have a paper from a famous university.

gazelle21• 7 years ago

Why?

droithomme• 7 years ago

if you're interested only in pedigree - nobody gives a ...

With this program, also Georgia Tech's MSCS program, you get the exact same classes, tests, and degree as students attending in person.

realbarack• 7 years ago

Same deal with Stanford SCPD, where I've taken a handful of classes. That was the key differentiator for me versus "pure" online offerings: since you're taking the exact same classes at the exact same time as full-time on-campus students, you have some guarantee of quality/rigor.

rchaud2• 7 years ago

The Georgia Tech program is half the cost of this, is it not? Plus, it's a CS degree from an institution that's known for its CS department. That's likely to carry more weight among employers hiring in AI/ML roles than a "Machine Learning" degree. Those kinds of programs aren't as mature as CS ones and it sort of puts them in the same category as stuff like Udacity's Nanodegree in "[hot tech topic].

I know Imperial College is a well-regarded and selective institution, but I think the point still stands.

gumby• 7 years ago

You can get degrees not just from ICL but UofI and other legit organizations via Coursera. Essentially they are using the Coursera platform the way Uber runs on AWS. The diploma doesn’t say anything about his and you may have taken some or all of your courses online.

This is different from audacity etc where the courses are essentially from udacity.

I only learned this bc my gf worked for Coursera: I don’t know if that’s because they have some deliberate marketing strategy or just because I didn’t pay attention. As she doesn’t work there any more, I can say it makes me uncomfortable. But to be honest: in the long run why should the online experience inherently be worse?

It could be just chauvinism on my part but I feel my university education could not have been as good had it not been F2F

faizshah• 7 years ago

One of the important parts of learning at a university is meeting fellow students, exchanging ideas, and building relationships. It seems for 36k USD you’re really overpaying for losing this face to face time with other students, imo video calls just aren’t the same.

MattPalmer1086• 7 years ago

I did an MSc online distance learning back in 2003 from Royal Holloway. I built a lot of useful relationships and had great conversations with my fellow online students.

Our lecturers said we were far more social than the campus students, who just went to lectures, the library, or home. Probably because we were all sitting on our own in front of a computer, so actively tried to counteract the loneliness of it...

ticmasta• 7 years ago

Also of note - this appears to be the UK-style of master's vs. the typical path a lot of us may be more familiar with, in the sense of very strong undergrads complete a 4th year and earn a Master's vs. finish an undergrad and then spend 2+ years (1 year classes, 1 year lab/thesis) as an in-betweener before Doctoral programs.

It seems very expensive for 2-yrs of part-time, online work. I did a MSc in Canada part time and it took me almost three years of year-round effort, completing the course requirements 2 or 3 per semester (which is more than 1/2 time). Because I was P/T I paid full tuition but it was still less than $5K/yr. F/T grad students were almost all on scholarship or covered tuition via RA pr TA duties.

IMO, if you want more than the credentials on your resume this would be an expensive and disappointing grad school experience and of limited value.

spzb2• 7 years ago

University education in the UK has become increasingly commercialised and increasingly expensive. Undergraduate tuition fees are over £9k a year (it was zero when I went to university 20 years ago). Those fees are capped by government but universities are free to charge what they like to overseas students so they are rather treated as cash cows.

iso18242• 7 years ago

Undergraduate tuition fees are over £9k a year (it was zero when I went to university 20 years ago).

That's wrong.

In 2000 the fees that the UK student had to pay was £1000 a year (£1700 in today's currency), and the government paid about £3000 - a total of £4000, or £6800 in today's money.

Students had to pay this upfront to study. In 2006 these upfront fees were dropped.

shawabawa3• 7 years ago

Student fees were introduced september 1998, or just over 21 years ago

Technically they're wrong but it's a very minor change to their point

spzb2• 7 years ago

OK, I was rounding. It was closer to 25 years ago but I try not to think about how old I am.

RomanBob• 7 years ago

University is just an overpriced IQ test anyway.

We want to delude ourselves that everybody has the capability to be a doctor, programmer, engineer, successful business owner etc. We ban employees from using IQ tests, when SAT scores correlate strongly with IQ. Then the best companies hire from the best universities where the best students with the highest SAT go i.e. they just hire the highest IQ people in each year slot.

To fund this delusion we would then have to make university available to everybody, as if a degree is in a vacuum a token of value and not the fact that a degree is relatively scarce. A degree when everybody has one isn't worth as much as when only 50% of people have one.

And of course the law of supply/demand makes degrees more expensive when everybody has one, but makes the degrees less useful economically when everybody has one. Double-dipped.

gmac• 7 years ago

You're effectively claiming that university teaches nothing, but good degrees teach independence, critical thinking (analysis, synthesis), research skills, writing, teamworking, presentation skills, and much more.

Added to that, your final grade indicates ability x effort. This is significantly more useful than a narrow measure of ability alone.

nicoburns• 7 years ago

good degrees teach independence, critical thinking (analysis, synthesis), research skills, writing, teamworking, presentation skills, and much more.

Sadly there aren't a lot of those. Most degrees teach regurgitating what a textbook says in a fancy way that means you pass the "I understood it" test.

bonoboTP5• 7 years ago

University is just an overpriced IQ test anyway.

Only from the point of view of employment market, and only when job skills and university material are widely disparate. (But universities do have a role beyond the employment market.)

To fund this delusion we would then have to make university available to everybody,

Do you mean university admission or university degrees? In many European countries admission is unlimited. For example several German computer science programs are open to anyone for free, with no SAT-like test requirement to get admitted. Whether you'll pass your exams is a different question.

And arguably if it's all about IQ testing, it should be for free, so you filter for high IQ instead of for kids of wealthy parents.

rwmj• 7 years ago

The "offline" course prices are here. It seems like the roughly equivalent MSc degree offline would be £15.5K for home and EU students and £33,250 for overseas students. You would have to add to that living expenses which are considerable in London (perhaps another £20K) https://www.imperial.ac.uk/students/fees-and-funding/tuition...

I did an MSc in Computer Science at Imperial (long before online courses existed) and it was by far the hardest academic thing I have ever done. Imperial is academically excellent, and likely the best university for science subjects in the UK and perhaps top 5 in the world. Having said that I'm sure much of the value is from being there with other students and teachers, and I don't know how much of that you're getting from an online course.

jdkee• 7 years ago

Shamefully the Univ. of Illinois charges $21k for an online master of CompSci.

https://cs.illinois.edu/academics/graduate/professional-mcs-...

Imperial College London charge £28,000 for their online MSc degree on Coursera

Related Stories