Electronic Engineering.

phantom_lord

What's this course like in DCU? would anyone recommand doing/not doing this course?

bullock

Keep well away .... you have been warned!!!! Its torture ... and for what. There is no jobs when you graduate!!!

spockety

I'm sure bullock's response is a bit of a generalisation, or based solely one persons experience.

Can we please have less of the sensationalism when people ask questions about courses?

tinkerbell

I reckon a good idea would be to take a gander at the DCU website, find the EE section, locate the name of a lecturer / head of the school, and give them a call. They'd be able to give ya good advice there as well, so you'd hear from a student's pov and a lecturer's pov.

OFDM

spockety wrote:

I'm sure bullock's response is a bit of a generalisation, or based solely one persons experience.

Can we please have less of the sensationalism when people ask questions about courses?

It is however an accurate generalisation - there's bugger all jobs for graduates at the moment unless they're lucky enough to get a 1.1.

spockety

He asked what the course was like, not the job prospects.

Anyway, I stand by what I said, if people have something negative to say
about a course, that's fair enough, but unsubstantiated negative sensationalism, rather than concrete reasoning does not help the OP.

Raz

It is however an accurate generalisation - there's bugger all jobs for graduates at the moment unless they're lucky enough to get a 1.1.

That's funny, cos I yesterday found out that I graduated from EE with a pass degree (and I repeated final year), and I've been employed for the last 2 weeks now in charge of customer care.

The course is difficult (I'm a very technical minded person yet I still had to repeat) but if you have a good work ethic, and prioritise your time properly you'll be fine. Obviously I didn't really do that.
There is a lot of maths in the course with differentiation and integration taking prominent roles. If you didn't do Honours maths (and reasonably well at that) you'll find it very difficult.

That said there's a lot of positive things about the course, if you're considering doing some form of computer programming course you will get pretty good exposure to the same material in EE if you choose.
There's a choice between 2 subjects in 3rd year, Mobile Robotics and Oject Oriented Programming.
Mobile Robotics: You build a 'taxi' where it must follow a white line (Done by shining LEDs on the ground and measuring the intensity of the reflected light). The taxi must pick up and drop off a 'passanger' at designated points and the group to navigate the course the quickest win some decent prizes.
Object Oriented Programming: You learn Java and C++ languages and do some projects. I did a colour chooser web applet and a messenging program (sent messages between computers).

There's a lot of lab work and in some cases you can pass subjects on lab work alone.
The number of girls in the classes is usually quite low (10 to 1 almost) but that just serves to help you concentrate better
All in all I found the course very interesting and I'm now qualified in one of the more difficult disciplines you can do. In a few years time nobody will care about the grade I got, all that will matter is how much experience I have.
The only case where the low grade degree affects me is in applying for postgraduate courses. They usually look for second class honours degree which is about 50% average for a 2.2 and about 60% for a 2.1. Over 70% for a 1.1

I think I wrote up a reply to a very similar question not too long ago. Check a few pages back or serch for posts I've made and you'll find it. That post was more detailed about the individual subjects.

[Edit: added quote]

phantom_lord

bullock wrote:

Keep well away .... you have been warned!!!! Its torture ... and for what. There is no jobs when you graduate!!!

What a way to scare someone after cao closed....
The figure i was given for the percentage of grads going into jobs was in the high 90s and that's a huge shortage of engineers especially electronic ones in this country.

spockety

phantom_lord wrote:

What a way to scare someone after cao closed....
The figure i was given for the percentage of grads going into jobs was in the high 90s and that's a huge shortage of engineers especially electronic ones in this country.

As I said, posts like that should probably be ignored.
It had no substance. Look for non-sensational posts with substance, and you will find the answers you're looking for.

Ishmael

Here is the main engineering page for Dcu http://www.eeng.dcu.ie

Maybe you could try contacting Mr. Jim Dowling or Professor Charles McCorkerel, they would probably be the best people to talk to.
Just send them an email or something.

I'd recommend if you're going for this course that you have a strong maths backround, leaving cert physics and chemistry are a help but not nessecary.

The course is as hard as you make it for yourself. There is a lot of lab work, projects and assignments and i found these really helpful, they help you learn and are also challenging at the same time.

First and second years are easy enough if have a bit of cop on. Third year will require a lot of work because you'll do work expierence and there is a lot difficult subjects crammed into the first semester.

I think they might be changing the format of the work expierence now tho so i'm not too sure as to how it will work in the future.

I can't comment on fourth year cause i haven't got there yet

bullock wrote:

Keep well away .... you have been warned!!!! Its torture ... and for what. There is no jobs when you graduate!!!

My brother graduated 3 years ago and got a job in IBM a month after he graduated. There is even more of a demand for them now because less people have been taking an interest in the degree in the last few years.

I think there was something like 8 ee students in the year behind me.

I think if you get into any of the degrees below, in first year you are all grouped as common entrants into the program and this leaves you open to deciding what area you want to go into in second year.
Choices like digital media engineering, telecommunications (maybe others, can't remember)or straight electronic engineering degree which is harder than the other 2.

My 2 Cents anywho

steveland?

I'm in Digital Media Engineering and I just finished second year (three repeats depending )

First year is common between all the electronic engineering side courses...

I wasn't a huge fan in first year but I enjoyed second year (in DME a lot more)

You do the common year (the CECE course) and even if you're not in CECE you can decide after first year to move into digital media engineering, electronic engineering or information and communications engineering

Electromag is probably the hardest subject btw, I failed that overall but was allowed to move into DME because you don't use Electromag for DME (the only ee course you don't use it for)

The heads of the EE school are Mr. Jim Dowling and Prof. Charles McCorkle, both of whom you'll be doing Electronic Fundamentals with in first year. Jim Dowling's a scary man but very fair when it comes to exams and if you need information or help with the course.

My main recommendation would be just make sure you attend the lectures... I didn't and failed both years \o/

It's an alright course if you're good at maths and physics but if you're not... well you're pretty much screwed...