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MSc Software Engineering with Advanced Research

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Why choose Herts?

Industry Accreditation: Accredited by the British Computer Society (BCS) enabling graduates to register at The Chartered Institute for IT as a Chartered IT Professional.
Employment Prospects: Graduates work as Business Analysts, Consultants, Software Engineers, and Application Developers for organisations including Capgemini, Optoma Technology, and Ocado.

Work Placement Opportunities: You have a one-year paid industry placement option. Previous students have worked for organisations including Apple, Intel, and Microsoft.

The normal requirement is a good Honours Degree (or equivalent) in computer science or cognate discipline. The choice of award title students may be accepted on to will be determined by the award applied for and the prior learning of the student as demonstrated by the transcript for existing qualifications held by the applicant.

Applicants whose first language is not English must demonstrate sufficient competence in English to benefit from the Programme. This is normally demonstrated by recognised awards equivalent to an overall IELTS score of 6.0. Candidates who do not satisfy these requirements will be considered on a case-by-case basis.

The programme is subject to the University's Principles, Policies and Regulations for the Admission of Students to Undergraduate and Taught Postgraduate Programmes (in UPR SA03), along with associated procedures. These will take account of University policy and guidelines for assessing accredited prior certificated learning (APCL) and accredited prior experiential learning (APEL).


Institution code	H36
School of study	School of Physics, Engineering and Computer Science
Course length	Full Time, 2 Years Full Time, 24 Months
Location	University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield

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Employability

What job can I get?

Our master's programme is designed to give Computer Science graduates the specialist, up-to-date skills and knowledge sought after by employers, whether in business, industry, government or research.

The MSc Cyber Security with Advanced Research course will equip students with in-depth knowledge and practical skills in cyber security.

Successful graduates may pursue a career in the cybersecurity industry, or any other industries that require in-house information security management such as educational institutions, hospitals, retail chains, banks, or government.

Professional Accreditations

This new version of the programme has been carefully designed to achieve appropriate levels of accreditation, and the department is currently in touch with the BCS regarding continued accreditation.

About the course

One of a range of degrees from the taught Master's Programme at the Department of Computer Science

This course considers current research and practice in cyber security. You will build the fundamental and advanced aspects of cyber security in terms of theory, practice, policy and security standard to enable critical cyber security decision marking, the extant threats to current and emerging systems and networks and the effective countermeasures to such threats in compliance with information security management standards, and the social, legal and ethical issues relating to cyber security in the context of digital forensics, information security management, penetrating testing and cyber operations

Why choose this course?

The award offers the opportunity for students to study advanced research topics in computer science, normally across multiple specialisms, and comprehensive research methods, and to undertake an extended masters project on a cutting-edge research topic.

One of a range of advanced courses within our postgraduate Master's programme in Computer Science, this particular course provides you with a specialism combining theoretical knowledge and practical skills in cyber security.

You will develop technical expertise and practical skills in identifying and critically evaluating vulnerabilities of and threats to the security and integrity of distributed systems, conducting and managing a comprehensive risk assessment of the distributed systems in a complex and unpredictable environment. Advanced topics studied include distributed systems security, information security, management and compliance, digital forensics, penetration testing, and cyber operations

Taught by a highly-regarded and long-established computer science department with strong links to business.
Computer Science saw 90% of its research ranked as world-leading (Research Excellence Framework, 2021).

What will I study?

Classes consist of lectures, small group seminars, and practical work in our well-equipped laboratories. We use modern, industry-standard software wherever possible. There are specialist facilities for networking and multimedia and a project laboratory especially for masters students. In addition to scheduled classes, you will be expected a significant amount of time in self-study, taking advantage of the extensive and up-to-date facilities. These include the Learning Resource Centres, open 24x7, with 1,500 computer workstations and wifi access, Studynet our versatile online study environment usable on and off campus, and open access to our labs.

Level 7

Module	Credits	Compulsory/optional
Measures and Models for Software Engineering	30 Credits	Compulsory
In this module advanced issues of software engineering theory and practice are examined. The range of software engineering products and processes making up a software project are measured and modelled. Typical software engineering products explored in the module may include: user requirements, design documents, code etc. Typical software engineering processes explored in the module may include: testing, debugging etc. The aim of the module is to use the modelling and measuring of such products and processes to allow quantified decision-making during software development. The module offers students the opportunity to explore both the state-of-the-art and the-state-of-the-practice in software engineering. The module will examine the most up to date research findings about software engineering as well as investigate the current practices of many software engineering companies. A more detailed description of the module content is provided in the module delivery information for students.
Programming for Software Engineers	30 Credits	Compulsory
Software engineering places great emphasis upon the use, and re-use, of components that are tightly specified and thoroughly tested. This approach is supported by the provision of software frameworks within which programs can be developed. A software framework typically provides an Application Programming Interface (API) implemented as a set of libraries, and supported by a set of tools that may be used during development. But where do APIs, ABIs and software libraries come from? How do we decide what components are required? How are they designed and implemented? Who builds them? How do they go about it? How are they tested? How can we be sure that they work? What effect does the design and implementation of APIs and software libraries have upon the performance of systems that employ them? This module attempts to address these and other issues associated with the design, construction and use of software frameworks.
Software Engineering Practice and Experience	30 Credits	Compulsory
This module gives students the opportunity to extend their understanding and experience of software engineering practice. It offers students exposure to the development and evolution of software. The module is very practical and is based around a substantial piece of software. The aim of the module is to enable students to develop software engineering knowledge and skills that are transferable to software companies. The module covers each element of the software engineering process. It explores the use of overarching development approaches such as eXtreme Programing and Component Based Software Engineering. Leading edge practices are introduced such as using program slicing to find code faults. Specialised software development approaches are investigated such as those required for application areas such as safety critical systems. Process models popular with industry, such as one of the SEI models, are also used and evaluated during this module. A more detailed description of the module content is provided in the module delivery information for students.
Software Engineering Masters Project	60 Credits	Compulsory
The project is a showpiece opportunity for students to demonstrate what they know about current research and practices in software engineering and show off their skills in applying software engineering models, methodologies, measures and tools in order to conduct a practical investigation or tackle a particular software engineering problem. The project is a self-directed piece of work, conducted with minimum online supervision that demonstrates the student's ability to plan and manage a substantial piece of work, and steer their own efforts. Students are expected to be thorough in their work, and, particularly, identify and tackle any difficult or challenging aspects of the problems they are trying to solve. It is not just the quantity, or even the quality of work that is considered when grading the project, but the level of difficulty and the scope of the problem being addressed.
Team Research and Development Project	15 Credits	Compulsory
Students working at, and beyond, Master's level are expected to understand both generic and domain-specific investigative methods, and to be able to apply them in their work. This module explores a range of such methods and helps students to enhance their proficiency in the skills that are expected of those working at postgraduate level. Furthermore, this module involves working actively as part of a team of fellow students on a complex, multi-domain computing problem. Typically, the project can be a research project to answer a research question, a thorough empirical investigation of a specific topic, or a development idea from student themselves, or a virtual or real client. Each team would be expected to manage the project, to report regularly to their supervisor(s) on the progress of the project, and to collectively deliver a set of appropriate outputs from the project. The output(s) of the team project will typically be a computing product or system and its presentation together with appropriate documentation.
Legal and Ethical Practice Exercise	15 Credits	Compulsory
The module will involve a broad case study involving the provisioning of a system which adheres to ethical and professional guidelines and standards. This will be a team project. One such case study might take the form of a large online platform where teams would have to create policies both for developers and users. The likely topics of those policies would be: issues involving sharing of user content, licensing of third party codes, moderation of content, consents from users relating to the tracking of user activity). The team would have to edit the platform such that all forms and submissions of user data are compliant with regulations particularly operative in the UK and the European Union.
Advanced Research Topics in Computer Science	30 Credits	Compulsory
This module aims to develop research and enquiry capabilities and is therefore structured around guided activities in terms of seminars, tutorials and research oriented courseworks. The module will build on introductory research experience from core modules and provide a structured approach to develop area specific expertise by undertaking a research activity in a chosen area of specialisation and in a group setting that mirrors contemporary research methods. A concrete outcome is a technical report that synthesizes problem definitions from relevant literature and identifies a research problem in a chosen topic.
Research Methods	30 Credits	Compulsory
This module explores a range of generic and domain-specific research methods in computer science to enable students to understand such methods and apply them in their work, particularly in an advanced MSc project or a research project. The module helps students to enhance their proficiency in the skills that are expected of those working at postgraduate level. Whilst some material will be presented in lectures, tutorials and labs, the module will be largely literature- and activity-based. It will place strong emphasis on self-management and will encourage students to reflect upon, and learn from, their own work. As the module progresses students will be expected to select an increasingly large proportion of the reading matter for themselves, so that they can tailor their learning to their individual needs in which they evaluate and choose an appropriate set of research methods for the investigation of a problem in a given sub-domain of computer science, and identify the principal advantages and limitations of those methods.

Further course information

Course fact sheets
MSc Software Engineering with Advanced Research	Download

Programme specifications
MSc Computer Science (Modular) with Advanced Research	Download

Additional information
Sandwich placement or study abroad year	n/a
Applications open to international and EU students	Yes

Student experience

At the University of Hertfordshire, we want to make sure your time studying with us is as stress-free and rewarding as possible. We offer a range of support services including; student wellbeing, academic support, accommodation and childcare to ensure that you make the most of your time at Herts and can focus on studying and having fun.

Find out about how we support our students

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Funding and fees
Other financial support

Find out more about other financial support available to UK and EU students

Fees 2022
UK Students

Full time
- £9450 for 2022/2023 and 2023/2024 inclusive
EU Students

Full time
- £16500 for 2022/2023 and 2023/2024 inclusive
International Students

Full time
- £16500 for 2022/2023 and 2023/2024 inclusive
Fees 2023
UK Students

Full time
- £9900 for 2023/2024 and 2024/2025 inclusive
EU Students

Full time
- £17950 for 2023/2024 and 2024/2025 inclusive
International Students

Full time
- £17950 for 2023/2024 and 2024/2025 inclusive
*Tuition fees are charged annually. The fees quoted above are for the specified year(s) only. Fees may be higher in future years, for both new and continuing students. Please see the University's Fees and Finance Policy (and in particular the section headed "When tuition fees change"), for further information about when and by how much the University may increase its fees for future years.

View detailed information about tuition fees

Living costs / accommodation

The University of Hertfordshire offers a great choice of student accommodation, on campus or nearby in the local area, to suit every student budget.

View detailed information about our accommodation

Read more about additional fees in the course fact sheet

2023

Start Date	End Date	Link
23/09/2023	31/05/2024	Apply online (Full Time)
20/01/2024	30/09/2024	Apply online (Full Time)

2024

Start Date	End Date	Link
23/09/2024	31/05/2025	Apply online (Full Time)
20/01/2025	30/09/2025	Apply online (Full Time)

MSc Software Engineering with Advanced Research

Why choose Herts?

What job can I get?

Professional Accreditations

About the course

Why choose this course?

What will I study?

Further course information

Student experience

Other financial support

Fees 2022

UK Students

Full time

EU Students

Full time

International Students

Full time

Fees 2023

UK Students

Full time

EU Students

Full time

International Students

Full time

Living costs / accommodation

2023

2024