UK: Where to Study Computer Sciences & Information Technology
An article that every future student should read.
Image source: isc.cardiff.ac.uk
I often get messaged on Linkedin by cybersecurity professionals asking for my advice where to study Computer Sciences & Information Technology and/or MSc in Cyber Security in UK.
Well, I'm very passionate about MSc in Cybersecurity course offered by Northumbria University. The first reason is - I've studied there, really enjoyed the course, met great peers and tutors with whom I'm in touch to-date and have been recently offered to join MSc in Cybersecurity course Advisory Board there. Secondly, the completion of the course gave such a boost to my career by almost doubling my annual salary.
However, this article is not about what I'm passionate about. We have recently welcomed few last year students on the internship basis to gain real life security operations experience. Together with the team we have decided to run a simple exercise that would suggest which UK universities are most efficient in bridging traditional education with career opportunities in cybersecurity field.
We have fundamentally focused only on the universities that offered Computer Sciences & Information Technology course. At first, we have analyzed the data provided by National Student Survey and we gave 10 points to the university with the highest student satisfaction rate. The university in the 10th place scored only 1 point from us. Below are TOP 10 UK universities whose students are most satisfied with the course quality.
Source: Quantum Cybersecurity Skills
As a second step, we have looked into the data of student employability within 15 months after graduation. We kept the same scoring approach. 10 points for No.1 and 1 point for No. 10. Universities outside TOP 10 didn't get any points from us.
Source: Quantum Cybersecurity Skills
Our third focus aspect was whether the course(s) provided by the university are recognized by NCSC. We gave 1 point to every university which was listed on NCSC website.
To continue our exercise, we used Linkedin to identify the number of profiles available with a specific current/past role. The logic was to identify the likelihood of someone becoming CISO or SOC Manager associated with a specific university. Due to time restrain, we didn't go into every Linkedin profile that has been presented to us by it's search engine to ensure the title is indeed matching.
So, let's start with the first role that we focused on - CISO.
Source: Quantum Cybersecurity Skills
The second role we have researched was SOC Manager. Here are the results.
Source: Quantum Cybersecurity Skills
We were also curious about Security Architect's role.
Source: Quantum Cybersecurity Skills
Results for Linkedin profiles that came up with current/past role being 'Security Engineer' are below.
Source: Quantum Cybersecurity Skills
We have continued researching how many profiles are there available with SOC Analyst role.
Source: Quantum Cybersecurity Skills
Last but not least, we have also researched on Linkedin how many profiles are coming up when we type 'Threat Hunter' and 'Pentester' roles and with which UK universities are those profiles associated. For each category we gave No. 1 university 10 points, and 1 point for the 10th university on the list. Universities that didn't make TOP10 list didn't score any points from us.
The outcome of our exercise has resulted in UK's TOP 10 universities where, according to data, students should be putting their money versus the likelihood of being employed as cybersecurity professionals.
Source: Quantum Cybersecurity Skills
To sump up, with £45,000 being an average UK student loan in 2020, today's graduates don't have the luxury of waiting 15 months to get their first full-time job. The expectation is that higher education institutions would help their Computer Science & Information Technology / Cyber Security course graduates to increase the speed and chances in landing their first job as cybersecurity professionals.
Sadly, so dear to me Northumbria University didn't make TOP 10 list.
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Quantum Cybersecurity Skills is a company revolutionizing risk management with security efficacy. We help optimize security maturity, security transparency from people, processes, technology and business alignment point of view. We effectively bridge security at Operational, Tactical and Strategical layers to improve security service quality and business agility.
Quantum Cybersecurity Skills comprises a diverse, Fortune 500, Global 2000 experienced range of Security Leaders from CISO, SOC Management, Pen-testing, Risk Auditing, Digital Transformation background. We call year 2019 as the birth of Quantum Cybersecurity Skills which was formalized in the following year.
Our team shines through diversity and is distributed across the globe in Montreal (Canada), Mexico City (Mexico), Tel Aviv (Israel), Valencia (Spain), Boston (USA) with HQ in London (UK). Globally distributed team enables us to offer a high quality, cost-effective 'follow the sun' service and address Data Privacy needs of global clientele.
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