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Graduation

Posted: Fri Jun 26, 2009 1:36 am
by cantab
I graduated today, with a Master of Natural Sciences (MSci) and a Bachelor of Arts (BA) from Trinity Hall, Cambridge. This marks the end of a four year course, with the BA awarded based on the first three, and the MSci from the final year. And indeed it marks the end of an era for myself.

(It is an oddity of Cambridge that all Bachelors' degrees are BAs, even when, as in my case, the subject studied is a science.)

Re: Graduation

Posted: Fri Jun 26, 2009 1:57 am
by Silence
Congrats.

A number of universities here offer a combined BS/MS program, but it usually takes five years. Nice to here you did it in four, though. What's next? A job somewhere?

I've always found it weird how every university I've seen lumps liberal arts and the pure sciences together.

Re: Graduation

Posted: Fri Jun 26, 2009 2:06 am
by cantab
By whatever route, it will usually take four years to get a Masters in the UK system. The Bachelors takes three years, and the Masters one year. This holds whether it's a combined course like mine, or seperate.

Science and Arts aren't 'lumped together' at Cambridge. One applies for a specific course, for example English, Modern and Medieval Languages, Mathematics, or whatever. It's only when it comes to the title of the degree that all three-year degrees are Bachelor of Arts. That's basically tradition (Cambridge is 800 years old). I have never studied anything that could be described as an Arts subject at Cambridge.

'Natural Sciences' is a Cambridge oddity however. It's basically an umbrella course covering all pure sciences. One takes three sciences and mathematics in the first year, three more specialised options in the second year, before fully specialising in the third and possible fourth years.