School of Computer Science

Tales from the Real World

School President James Anderson and Careers Adviser Ben Carter invited recent graduates Matt Hailey, Ali Scott, Craig Garrigan and Steve Lowson back to the School yesterday to share their experience of working in the real world since graduating, with our final year students.

They have been successful in securing positions at highly regarded companies including Sky Scanner, PlanForCloud, NCR and NCC Group. Talks described career paths, roles and responsibilities, professional development and current employment opportunities.

Find out more about using your Computer Science degree and read student case studies on the careers website. Thanks to all for a great afternoon. Yes, cakes were consumed.

CollageImage

Clockwise from top left:
Steve, Ali and Craig prepare to give their talk.
Matt and Ali reminisce in the coffee area.
James, Craig, Stephen, Ben, Ali and Matt joined our final year students for cake and questions.

Industrial Action Today

Dear Students,
As you probably know, all three main University trades unions have called for a withdrawal of labour on 31 October. In the School of Computer Science, we expect that most teaching scheduled that day will take place, and would advise all students to turn up for their lectures as normal, or even better, to turn up a little early just in case.

In particular, we can confirm that the Jack Cole and John Honey buildings will be open. Adequate safety cover, including first aiders and fire marshals will be in place.

Once we know what lectures, if any, have not been delivered, and whether the lecturers intend to cover the missed material themselves, we will make arrangements to fill any gaps. All lecture material should be placed on student resources as normal no later than the following day 1 Nov.

Steve Linton, Head of School

StACS Hackathon hosted by Witlr

StACS will be holding its first big event of the year! It will take place in the MSc Lab in the John Honey building between 7pm and 2am on November 14th. The topic will be data visualization and will be sponsored by Witlr (http://witlr.com/).

There will be free pizza, free hard and soft refreshments, a game room, and snacks available for everybody who participates. This event is open to PAID StACS members only and the challenge will be suitable for all skill levels. Membership may be paid for at the door and costs 3 pounds.

Event details

  • When: 14th November 2013 19:00 - 15th November 2013 02:00
  • Where: Honey 110 - MSc Lab

Creating High Value Cloud Services at ScotSoft Forum

On August 29th Gordon Baxter, Derek Wang and Ian Sommerville (St Andrews), along with Ian Allison (RGU) manned the stand for the SFC funded project “Creating High Value Cloud Services” at Scotland IS’s annual ScotSoft Forum. There were over 500 people at the event which was held in Edinburgh’s Sheraton Grand Hotel. The programme of talks that took place throughout the afternoon included presentations by Larry Cable (Salesforce) and a keynote by Vint Cerf (Google).

Find out more about the project on Services to the Cloud and The Cloudscape blog

Creator of the World Wide Web Honoured

Professor Alan Dearle from the School of Computer Science, and Dean of Science at the University, has the honour of acting as Laureator for Sir Tim Berners-Lee today, one of the international scholars and thinkers awarded an Honorary Degree as part of the University’s 600th Anniversary celebrations.

Join Professor Dearle and Sir Tim Berners-Lee and watch the Honorary Graduation Live on the University website.

Computer Science Orientation Week 2013

After a welcome talk by Head of School Steve Linton, orientation 2013 is underway in the School. Monday and Tuesday offered various overviews, module talks and academic briefings. Anyone who missed these events will find related material on the School Homepage.

School President James Anderson represented the School at Academic Fayre. Student activity was observed in the honours lab and that’s before the official start of semester. We are particularly pleased to welcome the first intake of Gateway students.

orientation

A Gaming afternoon for first year students proved popular on Wednesday with Halo, Fifa and Lego Star Wars in operation. An undergraduate pizza fest followed later in the afternoon with an excellent turn out demonstrating the friendly supportive nature of our returning cohort. It’s great to see them back for another year of hard work.

gamefest1

pizzatime

The student experience is paramount here in the school, so we take this opportunity to thank our recent graduates for the NSS 2013 results, where they rated individual subjects for student satisfaction. St Andrews was number one in the UK for Computer Science. We aim to keep it that way.

PhD Reading Party 2013

The 2013 PhD Reading Party was held last month at the Burn House, just outside Edzell in the North East of Scotland.

It was an opportunity for research students to give a talk in a relaxed atmosphere, about their research interests. It also allowed for some socialising while wandering through the nearby woods and rivers.
burn1
Each student gave a 5 minute talk with time for questions and discussions. Additionally, to encourage them to make the presentation of their research industry-friendly, a pitching competition was set up. The top three were: Shantanu Pal, Dean Phoomikiattisak and Shyam Reyal. The whole academic part of the trip was rounded off by a talk by Tom Kelsey on ‘Academic Careers’.

burn2
In the free time some went off to explore the nearby forest and salmon rich river while others decided to play football or volleyball, enjoy the quiet surroundings or build the highest Jenga tower at the Burn, so far.

Text and Images courtesy of Ruth Hoffmann, Jamie Carson and Shyam Reyal.