The PhD Reading Party of 2014 took place in the serene Burn House, outside Edzell bordering on the Cairngorms.
The PhD students had the opportunity to talk about their research, hear talks from staff as well as socialise with all other participants outside the academic work environment.
The lovely Scottish weather permitted everyone to explore the grounds, river and star gaze amongst other activities. Looks like everyone had great fun.
Twas the week before orientation, when all through the labs not a student was stirring.
Tranquility in Computer Science
We are looking forward to welcoming our new students next week, and seeing the labs bustling with creativity once again. Find out all you need to know about Orientation 2014 on the School homepage.
Congratulations to Dr Graeme Stevenson, who passed his PhD viva earlier today. He is pictured below with supervisor Professor Simon Dobson and Internal Examiner Dr Graham Kirby. Professor Julie McCann from Imperial College, acted as External Examiner.
Congratulatory Cheers
What is Meyer’s E1 problem?
John Slaney, Australian National University
The E1 problem is a rather specialised question concerning propositional logic. It was posed by R. K. Meyer almost 50 years ago, and is still open. In this talk, I undertake to explain the problem, to review progress towards its solution and possibly even to make it look less eccentric than it might at first seem. The talk is accessible to anyone with an interest in computer science or logic, as it does not presuppose any great technicalities.
John Slaney is Professor of Computer Science at Australian National University, Canberra.
His research has focussed on many aspects of logic and artificial intelligence, sometimes from a very philosophical standpoint but also from a very practical one of building better solvers. He also wrote Logic4Fun, an interactive logic modelling and solving website.
John Slaney has never denied rumours that he was a professional ice hockey player in North America, including scoring the winning goal in a Canada-USSR match. However, if asked he probably will deny them (since he was never a hockey player).
Last September a diverse group of students arrived at orientation to begin, their MSc journey.
Start of the journey: September 2013
After a year of hard work, and an intensive summer project, students submitted their final dissertation last week. Earlier today they had an opportunity to present their posters and demonstrate their project artefacts.
MSc Poster Session: Pinning, Preparation and Presentation
End of the MSc journey: August 2014
With prizes awarded to the top 3 posters and cakes for all, the session proved busy and provided the perfect occasion to meet with second markers, reflect upon the dissertation journey and appreciate the projects completed by their peers.
Congratulations to Alice Herbison (overall winner): The design and implementation of DentalAnx, (best runner-ups) Bejamin Yakubu: AMLA Android Multimedia Learning Aid, and Thomas Brunner: Interactive Realtime Analysis of Social Media Data, all three received the coveted amazon vouchers.
Clockwise from top left: Benjamin, Alice and Thomas complete with poster. Receiving Amazon vouchers
We wish them all, every success with future plans, and look forward to seeing them again at December 2014 Graduation!
The results of the 2014 National Student Survey (NSS) were released this week and 100% of our students reported themselves “satisfied” (20%) or "very satisfied” (80%) with their course. This places Computer Science at St Andrews top in the UK.
The School was also top in a number of other categories including “Staff are good at explaining things”, “Assessment arrangements and Marking have been fair”, “I have been able to contact staff when I needed to”, “Good advice was available when I needed to make study choices” and ” I have been able to access general IT resources when I needed to”.
The NSS collects satisfaction levels from undergraduate students in the UK, via a survey. The survey is sent to all students in the UK a few months before they graduate and gets a very high return rate.
We are delighted that our recent graduates feel so positive about their student experience and wish them every success with future endeavours.
Computer Science Graduation 2014
Read more about the survey, the 2014 results and its ongoing review at the Funding Council website, in the University news and in the media.
Congratulations to James Montgomery, the overall video winner in “Love Learning” an annual competition run by UCAS and The Times.
James viewed the contest as an opportunity to express the passion that he has developed for computing during his first year of study in the School of Computer Science. We congratulated him earlier this week, and asked him to comment on the motivation and inspiration behind the video.
I was particularly inspired by lectures on abstraction levels, and discovering that sliced onion lends itself so well to animation was a deciding factor in choosing my subject matter. I’m delighted to have received the overall prize, and hope my video will encourage more people to consider pursuing computer science at university.
UCAS love learning seeks to inspire the next generation of students to study a related subject at university and encourages students to bottle their enthusiasm and distil it into a winning formula.
Very, well done to James. You can view his winning video along with other entries on the competition results website.
MSc students take time out of their busy schedule to enjoy a summer BBQ. A sunny July day presented an opportunity to relax and reflect on all their hard work, before submitting their dissertations. Later this month they will present their posters, and demonstrate their project artefacts. We look forward to viewing the culmination of a journey that started a year ago.
Images courtesy of MSc students.
Congratulations to St Andrews student Simone Ivan Conte, who has been selected as one of the four finalists in the Young Software Engineer of the Year Award 2014.
Simone’s project (pictured below) involved creating a haptic device and API for displaying vector graphics (e.g., trees and graphs) for people with visual disabilities. According to his Senior Honours dissertation supervisor, Dr. Miguel Nacenta
this work demonstrates a lot of ingenuity and has a large potential impact.
The Young Software Engineer of the Year Awards are given for the best undergraduate software projects completed by students studying computer science and software engineering in Scotland.
Simone graduated in Computer Science from St Andrews earlier this year and is currently working for Adobe on a summer internship. In September he will start his doctoral studies, funded by Adobe, with Professor Alan Dearle at St Andrews.
Previous finalists and prize winners have included Thomas Grimes, Alistair Scott, Craig Paul, Angus MacDonald, Ben Catherall and Graeme Bell. Further testament to the quality of talented students graduating from the School of Computer Science.
The winners of this year’s award will be revealed on 2nd October 2014! Fingers crossed.
Congratulations to the Senior Honours Class of 2014, our MSci (Honours) students and our PhD students, who graduate today. Students were invited to a reception in the School to celebrate their achievement with staff, friends and family. Our graduates will move on to a wide variety of interesting and challenging employment and further study opportunities, and we wish them all well with their future careers.
Images courtesy of Saleem Bhatti and Lisa Dow
