2017/18
Reports from student surveys, lecturer responses, and short introductory videos
This page presents feedback from students about their experience on Informatics courses, to help future students in their course choices. There are also responses from the lecturers and many short introductory videos for individual courses. Please note that lecturers regularly revise course content and presentation from year to year — often directly in response to exactly this feedback.
Do not redistribute or reuse this material without permission. If you would like another format or want to use it in your own publication then please contact the Informatics Teaching Organisation.
Feedback reports
The most recent feedback is from 2017/18, and covers 93 courses at all levels in the School of Informatics. Please note that not all courses run every year and course content changes from year to year. See the Course Index for current details of all courses offered.
The tables below bring together 1,235 individual submissions from students, gathered through an online survey at the end of each semester. Each course lecturer has been invited to write a response, and these are linked alongside the student feedback.
The published reports contain free-text responses by students about their experience of each course and recommendations to others planning their studies. Each course organiser receives this report as well as statistics on multiple-choice responses. All these reports, together with student feedback about individual members of teaching staff, are collected and sent to the Director of Teaching.
Please note that these are personal responses from individual students: some courses have a low response rate, and a small sample can be unrepresentative. To find out more about each course yourself, go to the index at http://course.inf.ed.ac.uk and browse the current course web pages.
Each year we remove responses that contain offensive language or otherwise breach the University Dignity and Respect policy. In 2018/19 there were three responses removed for offensive language, three more for other breaches of the Dignity and Respect policy, and two edited to remove personally identifying details. One course report has been withdrawn at the request of the lecturer. There was no other editing or selection of results before publication.
Notes on the tables
The word (new) after a lecturer name indicates a change in the staff teaching a course.
Courses are grouped by year taken. Note that many honours courses may be taken in a choice of years: these are listed as Year 3/4 or Year 4/5/MSc as appropriate.
Viewing each feedback report requires DICE authentication: you must have an School of Informatics user account to log in and download these.
We provide the introductory videos in both MP4 (MPEG) and OGV (Ogg) formats for different browsers
Year 1 courses (Level 8)
| Course Name | 2019/20 Lecturer | 2018/19 Feedback | Lecturer Response |
|---|---|---|---|
| Computer Programming Skills and Concepts | Alexandru / Rajan | report (Bradfield / Marina / Rajan) | |
| Informatics 1 - Cognitive Science | Lucas / Keller | report (Lucas / Shillcock) | |
| Informatics 1 - Computation and Logic | NOT RUNNING 2018/19 | report (Fourman) | |
| Informatics 1 - Data and Analysis | Stark | report (Stark) | |
| Informatics 1 - Functional Programming | NOT RUNNING 2018/19 | report (Sannella) | |
| Informatics 1 - Object-Oriented Programming | Seeker | report (Hospedales) |
Year 2 courses (Level 8)
| Course Name | 2019/20 Lecturer | 2018/19 Feedback | Lecturer Response |
|---|---|---|---|
| Informatics 2A - Processing Formal and Natural Languages | Cryan / Cohen | report (Longley / Cohen) | |
| Informatics 2B - Algorithms, Data Structures, Learning | Kalorkoti / Shimodaira | report (Kalorkoti / Shimodaira) | |
| Informatics 2C - Introduction to Computer Systems | Grot | report (Grot) | |
| Informatics 2C - Introduction to Software Engineering | Jackson | report (Jackson) | |
| Informatics 2D - Reasoning and Agents | Lascarides / Belle (new) | report (Lascarides) | |
| Discrete Mathematics and Mathematical Reasoning | Etessami / Stirling | report (Etessami / Stirling) |
Year 3 courses (Level 9)
| Course Name | 2019/20 Lecturer | 2018/19 Feedback | Lecturer Response |
|---|---|---|---|
| AI Large Practical | NOT RUNNING 2018/19 | report (Smaill) | |
| Automated Reasoning | Fleuriot | report (Fleuriot) | |
| Computer Architecture | NOT RUNNING 2018/19 | report (Grot / Nagarajan) | |
| Computer Design | Topham | report (Topham) | |
| CS Large Practical | NOT RUNNING 2018/19 | report (Gilmore) | |
| Foundations of Natural Language Processing | Lascarides / Thompson | report (Lascarides) | |
| Introductory Applied Machine Learning | Goddard |
report (Goddard) report (Distance Learning) (Goddard) |
|
|
Introduction to Vision and Robotics
|
Hospedales / Herrmann (new) Hospedales |
report (Hospedales / Mistry) report (Distance Learning) (Hospedales / Mistry) |
|
| Operating Systems | O'Boyle | report (O'Boyle) | |
| SE Large Practical | NOT RUNNING 2018/19 | report (Gilmore) | |
| System Design Project | Webb | report (Hillston / Webb) |
Year 3/4 courses (Level 10)
| Course Name | 2019/20 Lecturer | 2018/19 Feedback | Lecturer Response |
|---|---|---|---|
| Algorithms and Data Structures | Mayr | report (Mayr) | |
| Computational Cognitive Science | Lucas | report (Lucas) | |
| Computer Security | Arapinis / Kohlweiss | report (Arapinis / Vaniea) | |
| Compiling Techniques | Dubach | report (Dubach) | |
| Computer Communications and Networks | Marina | report (Lee) | |
| Database Systems | Guagliardo | report (Guagliardo) | |
| Elements of Programming Languages | NOT RUNNING 2018/19 | report (Cheney) | |
| Introduction to Theoretical Computer Science | Heunen / Sun | report (Bradfield) | |
| Professional Issues | S.Anderson | report (Fourman / S.Anderson) | |
| Software Testing | Rajan | report (Rajan) |
Year 4 courses (Level 10)
| Course Name | 2019/20 Lecturer | 2018/19 Feedback | Lecturer Response |
|---|---|---|---|
| Honours Project (Informatics) | Sannella | report (Sannella) | |
| Intelligent Autonomous Robotics | NOT RUNNING 2018/19 | report (Webb) | |
| MInf Project (Part 1) | Sannella | report (Sannella) |
Year 4/5/MSc courses (Level 11)
Year 5/MSc courses
Most MSc study is at Level 11. However, MSc students may take up to 30 credit points of Level 9 and Level 10 courses. Those are listed in the sections above for Year 3 and Year 4; except for the MSc-specific Introduction to Java Programming which appears here.
Informatics Teaching Organisation
Contact details
- Work: +44 131 651 3251
- Web: Internal Enquiries
- Web: External Enquiries
Address
- Street
Room 6.05
Appleton Tower
11 Crichton Street- City
- Edinburgh
- Post Code
- EH8 9LE
Availability
Monday–Friday 9.30am to 4.00pm, closing 12.30–1.30pm for lunch.