Programming Degree

UCT FTW...i think they have won the ACM competitions for the last 4 years or something, they are the top university in SA and they have just started a Computer Games Design stream.Many of their post grad students have been approached to start careers with the likes of Google and Nvidia.

With regards to UWC winning that MS competition....lol...its an MS competition....enough said :P

PS: i might be a little biased :D
 
UKZN?:P whats that..

my gf's brother is doing his comp.Eng degree there at Howard..
 
lol better than my gf who was at the normal uni, now she is at WITS way better.
 
Dont know about the SA market, but in the UK, having a degree is a must. You might still get a job without it, but its not going to be a good one, and you may find yourself first in line for redundancy.

Also note that from 1 April 2009, The UK Tier 1 visa, previously HSMP, now requires a Masters degree as a bare minimum. And you may need to prove that it was taught in English.

I dont think I have seen a single IT job adv in London that doesnt mention degree. Even if its not required, its the one without the degree will be cut first.

Get that degree, but dont think you know everything once you have it :)
 
The University of Johannesburg's B.Sc. I.T. degree is accredited with the British Computer Soceity. Not sure what accreditation other universities are offering.
 
Sackboy said:
This is for when some of us get to management level and have to make decisions that involve more than mere programming.:p
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I disagree with that, you can have the degree and still be a piss poor manager.
 
KamikazeHamster said:
The University of Johannesburg's B.Sc. I.T. degree is accredited with the British Computer Soceity. Not sure what accreditation other universities are offering.
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Did my engineering degree there, the BSc I.T. course is a joke.
 
SteveO said:
UCT FTW...i think they have won the ACM competitions for the last 4 years or something, they are the top university in SA and they have just started a Computer Games Design stream.Many of their post grad students have been approached to start careers with the likes of Google and Nvidia.

With regards to UWC winning that MS competition....lol...its an MS competition....enough said :P

PS: i might be a little biased :D
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Err, LOL, if they won the ACM then UCT would be one of the best universities in the world, they didn't feature in the grand scale of things but that said I competed in the Standard Bank IT challenge this year and Stellenbosch beat UCT by far and Stellenbosch wins it every year.

Keeping that fact in mind, the Standard Bank IT challenge is nothing compared to ACM, it's on a whole different league, African Universities don't feature on the list of winners last I checked.

Stellenbosch is were I'd study IT if I had the choice, second to that Tuks because I don't like Cape Town, there's too much wind :p
 
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I'm studying through UNISA as Im alreasy employed as a developer, but Stellies is great for school leavers. Many IT companies are relocating to Technopark and surroundings (includeing Somerset West) and building up a buddy list is what gets you the job.

One Stellies student at our company got 3 of his buddies jobs with us (we are 11 developers) - its a who you know and not what you know world.
 
cbrunsdonza said:
I'm studying through UNISA as Im alreasy employed as a developer, but Stellies is great for school leavers. Many IT companies are relocating to Technopark and surroundings (includeing Somerset West) and building up a buddy list is what gets you the job.

One Stellies student at our company got 3 of his buddies jobs with us (we are 11 developers) - its a who you know and not what you know world.
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True.. all the developers, ba's and project managers are uj graduates where I work.. Varsity is about developing problem solving skills...
 
SteveO said:
UCT FTW...i think they have won the ACM competitions for the last 4 years or something, they are the top university in SA and they have just started a Computer Games Design stream.Many of their post grad students have been approached to start careers with the likes of Google and Nvidia.

With regards to UWC winning that MS competition....lol...its an MS competition....enough said :P

PS: i might be a little biased :D
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Yeah, we've (UCT) won the Africa/Middle East section of the ACM World Programming competition for at least the last 4 years in a row. I'm one of those fabled socially inept postgrads that you speak of. One of my mates who is also a masters student worked for Google at the Zurich office a few months ago, while my other mate just got back from a 4 month stint at NVidia. Lots of people end up working for Microsoft and a few at Amazon and MXit. Its really useful to be part of a faculty that is well 'networked' if you understand me. For instance, my supervisor knows Google employee number 6 quite well, our head of department knows the heads of the ACM and BCS etc. The computer science degree streams are quite varied, so you can pretty much couple computer science with anything else that interests you; anything from linguistics to physics to bio-informatics and geography can be effectively paired with computer science all the way up to phd level. Or you can be boring like me and do a bit of everything during your undergrad.
 
Gnome said:
Err, LOL, if they won the ACM then UCT would be one of the best universities in the world, they didn't feature in the grand scale of things but that said I competed in the Standard Bank IT challenge this year and Stellenbosch beat UCT by far and Stellenbosch wins it every year.
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UCT didn't win the overall ACM, just the Africa-Middle East section, i.e.: top university from all of africa and the middle east. The Russian universities tend to dominate, and MIT often get an ass-raping (considering their standing). Stellenbosch didn't win the Standard Bank IT challenge 3 years ago, because I remember being pissed that a few of my class mates got new laptops for winning.

Remember that UCT is in the top 200 list of universities in the world, which is far higher than most other South African universities. I'm not even sure whether Stellenbosch has a dedicated Computer Science department. Last I heard it was grouped with Maths and Engineering or something to that affect.
 
why do u want to work for a big multinational.. South africa has lots of IT problems...
 
To anyone willing to read my post:

For the love of God, please, I repeat PLEASE, do not do a Diploma in Programming or some s**t like that.

It teaches NOTHING.

Varsities are BY FAAAAR better for teaching LOGIC.

/rant finished.

FWIW, UCT has a nice Post Grad Diploma in Security, Auditing etc.
I may have a look at that.

:)
 
KamikazeHamster said:
The University of Johannesburg's B.Sc. I.T. degree is accredited with the British Computer Soceity. Not sure what accreditation other universities are offering.
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Means nothing. Cambridge and Oxford aren't even on it (nor is Stanford, Harvard, MIT.....)

Point is, a good Uni shouldn't need to be on a 'society' to prove it's worth...

;)
 
iDenTiTy said:
Means nothing. Cambridge and Oxford aren't even on it (nor is Stanford, Harvard, MIT.....)

Point is, a good Uni shouldn't need to be on a 'society' to prove it's worth...

;)
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It is quite important if you ever want to be a chartered IT professional (like a chartered accountant of IT), which is awarded by the BCS. UCT have been trying to get their BCS status re-activated but it takes lots of money. Its not so much the course content, but has more to do with whether every class has a class representative, how assignments are submitted and marked etc.
 
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