UNSW Library. Photo credit: Tap That
The University of New South Wales is one of Australia's most prestigious universities. There's high demand for places and UNSW sets some of the toughest course entry requirements in the country. It's located in the Sydney suburb of Kensington, not far from the CBD. You are invited to rate UNSW (as a place to study) and post a student review if you've ever attended the university.
UNSW Rating
Australia Ranking 3
Based on world university rankings.
Source: Australian Universities
Source: Australian Universities
Rob
Never be fooled by its QS ranking of 19.
For students who have no intention of pursuing a PhD, this is the worst university in Australia. Never be fooled by its QS ranking of 19.
They parade around with flashy moral slogans, pretending to care about every student. But when it comes to actual interests, you will encounter the most rigid, bureaucratic, and heartless management system. Just remember, this is a demon school, and you’re paying them to trade for a degree. Don’t expect a demon to give you anything for free. Yes, that’s what the so-called “help” from the Student Hub is all about. They only assist you in spending more money on your studies, like enrolling in more courses. However, if you try to apply for RPL (Recognition of Prior Learning) or get exempted from irrelevant time-wasting activities, whether they are courses or something else, you’ll face countless obstacles. Their review standards and processing time limits are like children’s doodles—they may look like they make sense, but in reality, they are nonsense. They only manage and review in ways that benefit the school’s revenue, with no regard for students’ personal development or real situations.
To be clear, I’m not targeting the university’s teachers. Many of them are passionate, genuinely care about students, and are highly respectable. But outside of the classroom, the chaos and backwardness of the school’s management will show you the darkest, most terrible side of Australian education.
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Anon
Looking for the exits.
Rotten toxic place. Bad management that runs like some third-world tin-pot regime and largely hides inside a brick building with CIA style airlock doors. This physical isolation extends to a virtual isolation where any thing needing attention (particularly important matters) is sent to a sea of bureaucratic mid-wits who will endlessly shuffle your request around and block it at every turn, hiding behind a huge sea of overly-legalistic governance policies and procedures (80s East Germany would be proud). The gas-lighting of this place is extreme, such that they will happily violate all their own policies and procedures, if it’s convenient to them, but rigidly enforce the most petty aspects in as punitive a manner as possible if that’s more convenient to their immediate interests (especially against students). The lovely flowery statements of ethics (they have none), transparency (there is none) and openness (closed doors everywhere) are largely corporate spin cooked up from their addiction to 00s managerial consultancy-ism.
There are lots of unhappy students, and many of the good, caring and capable staff have either left or are in the midst of their exit strategies (like me). The place touts as top 19 in the world but if you look into that list closely, and do your own sensible comparisons, you’ll realise the ranking really isn’t telling you much of the reality. For aussie unis like this one, the rankings are a just game to be manipulated so they can fool international students into coming. This in turn is vital for bankrolling the huge executive salaries (not just the VC) and building expensive, fancy-looking but practically useless monuments. Sure, the teaching spaces in the brochures look nice, but they’re pretty impractical, as you’ll find out if you study there.
The three term calendar is a disaster that anyone there who isn’t inside the chancellery will happily tell you about at great length (try finding anyone who is fond of it). Management know it doesn’t work, but they are so beholden to the massive sunk-cost-fallacy of it that they’ll just grin and bear it, and let it all be the next executive’s problem once they’ve taken their cash and fled the campus.
If you’re thinking of going here, make sure to take a very good hard look under the veneer and marketing spin. Perhaps wander around some random day and ask some random staff and students how they really feel about the place. It’ll tell you more than the bloat produced by their marketing army ever will.
As for me, I’m counting the days… literally. Toxic. Life would be much better anywhere else.
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GUEST
UNSW Civil Engineering
UNSW Civil Engineering is completely trash, all theoretical and not practical at all. This uni has caused for me an immense amount of stress and anxiety, and thereby permanent health problems. The course is very intense and demanding, with crap lecturers who are still trying to cram 13 weeks of content into 9. Lecturers are so trash. The finals are double pass, and the exams ruin us students as they are extremely tough. We have to study all the hard calculations, so we don’t fail the finals (therefore failing the unit), and in doing so we neglect learning concepts properly. However if we spend time learning concepts properly, we will not pass the final exam and thus fail the subject. So it’s either we pass and barely understand concepts, resulting in lack of knowledge or we have knowledge but fail. Save yourself the stress and therefore health issues and go to a practical university like UTS which is chill and doesn’t have assignments. Also UNSW only cares about money. They randomly change when subjects are offered and therefore delay our graduation, and if you apply for cross-institutional study, they reject you because they want the money.
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Dean
Average University
I agree, they reject cross institutional studies.
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EmiliaZ
Don't do Graduate Diploma of Psychology at UNSW
If you are thinking of doing a Graduate Diploma of Psychology at UNSW, my advice to you is walk past, don’t look back. Don’t repeat the stupid and expensive mistake I made thinking this was a proper degree run by proper people. Their head is this scary and ignorant eastern European woman, who seems to have stepped down from her position of a Deputy Principal somewhere in the USSR and got sent here. She doesn’t have a slightest respect or care for students and doesn’t even hide it. Instead, she goes out of her way to turn a blind eye and refuses to acknowledge her and other teaching staff’s mistakes. What’s even worse, you can’t understand her because of her very heavy accent. Unfortunately, it’s mostly her voice you’ll be listening to in the lecture recordings, understanding little or nothing at all. Very frustrating, given that you pay around $4000 for a subject. If you have any questions or issues she will make it clear it’s your and only your problems, she won’t admit to her or the faculty mistakes even if they are clear as day. It appears that other tutors or lecturers are afraid of her and end up just echoing whatever she says. I feel scammed and will always remember this as the worst of my education experiences.
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FS
Do not study or work here
Studied and worked here. Rotten behind the shiny marketing front.
Covid revealed its true face:
Utterly poor response to covid: delays safety lockdown communication until after day you can’t withdraw from courses and not pay fees. Places more value on $$$ than human safety. Utterly inhumane.
Used crisis to get rid of experienced knowledgeable long term staff and 2 years later replace with cheap graduates/students. No industry experience or knowledge. Does not understand that people make the organisation. Just sees people in terms of $ and cost.
No wonder teaching has been going down the drain. QILT teaching scores at bottom or near bottom for years of all Aus universities at <60% and falling for years. (The VC on $million salary spins result as "resilient", without mentioning it's consistently at bottom rank of course.) Lecturers read off slides and has strong accents. I learned more from YouTube. No wonder unsw is outsourcing content creation to educational media companies. What is point of uni then?
Some positive employee reviews elsewhere appear to be fake in order to present UNSW in a good light, especially after the huge wage theft of casual academics has been exposed ($$$ millions affecting thousands of employees spanning at least 6 years.), for which staff has been alerted to yet did nothing until the Fair Work Ombudsman intervened. Does not hesitate to take advantage of the weak position of others = definition of bullying and exploitation.
Staff dump extra work on you and expect you to carry out extra without pay, then lie to you about entitlements. Worse thing is they've been getting away with it for years and now are just getting a slap on the hand despite underpaying thousands of casuals $millions. Gets away with it because no oversight and protects its own. No consequence for wrongdoing.
Complain and you'll be ignored, isolated and stonewalled. Doesn't even follow its own complaints policy to even respond to complaints, knowing there'll be no consequences. Highly political environment and manipulation. Management is authoritarian and vindictive with closed communication and double speak. Tip: always double check what you're told and what's happening behind the scenes. The laughable part is that they think people can't see through it or check facts in 2 seconds. Shows how ignorant they must think of others and arrogance in their ability to "control" employees passive aggressively. You'd actually get better conditions, better respect for employees, and better EQ in industry.
Also beware that your activities could be secretly monitored if you complain, which is intimidating and possibly breach privacy law.
(Google for news article on how its own privacy officer likely broke privacy law, demonstrating utter lack of understanding and/or disregard. Also Google how it hired a private investigator on a former professor who sued – personal information that required consent to be legally collected.)
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Anon
Agree.
Absolutely second this.
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user name
Greedy cash cow, worst teaching and prospects
Cash cow greedy money making scheme where they make as much fees off you as possible while you teach yourself. Lecturers/tutors are FOB and young that probably just graduate (some haven’t even graduated yet, being still students), yet they want to teach me things of how things work in real corporate life? THey regurgitate from textbooks with no real world experience. You don’t learn anything useful for the real world and I have to teach myself everything for work.
The uni excuse is you’re not in high school anymore, you have to be self sufficient. But that does not mean offloading the teaching leading students to teach yourself everything and relying on YouTube videos because the teaching is so BAD. They’re essentially charging thousands of dollars for me to watch 10 hours of lectures and do multiple choice exams. They keep asking for feedback, but don’t do anything with it, don’t change, and don’t give any feedback on your assessments in turn. A lot of materials are online now, which means they’ve recorded it once and are now milking money off it by replying materials from years ago.
And there is no student support. Be prepared to Google everything yourself. Admin staff are dismissive and ignorant.
nope
UNSW Canberra - Master of Cyber Security (Advanced Tradecraft)
Hello fellow future students – placing my feedback here after almost completing a postgrad degree at UNSW @ ADFA (Canberra campus) as filing feedback through the university and then also the ombudsman is a lengthy and unrewarding process, so cutting the head off the snake at this level is far more effective outcome for anyone wishing to partake in what I have just completed.
This feedback is only pertinent to the Cyber Security stream, I havent experienced or spoken to other students from other programs so they could potentially be well delivered and supported.
-Each course is approximately $4k AUD and you have x8 to complete. International students can look forward to paying more. The reason I make this point is, as a student you are paying a premium to be taught to the highest of levels. You can expect to teach yourself through extensive hours of google or student forums, as the instructors are barely present or reliable (across x8 subjects I have enjoyed x3 classes because the instructors came from industry and not academia). If you don’t come into this degree knowing everything you need to know then you can forget aiming for great marks. Instructors dont have the staffing or care factor to provide timely feedback so you can improve your skills, or if they do its never in time to make modifications for a resubmit prior to any deadlines.
-This degree does not make you employment ready, or even desireable for employment. If you dont have SANS/GIAC/ISACA/EC Council/Microsoft/AWS/Google/CISCO certifications, as well as a few years experience on-top of this degree, you wont be able to to score entry/intern/mid/executive level employment in any industry or sector ….. in any country …. is my personal experience.
-The Cyber Security landscape is yet to be understood is my opinion. There are about 7 ‘hats’ in Cyber Security and this degree prepares you for none of them. It more ‘introduces’ you to the Cyber Security landscape problem and prepares you for none.
-As touched on before, if you want good grades then you should know everything you need to know before entering this degree, becase you wont be shown what you need to know, you will be told what you need to do and Google the rest because ‘that is what is expected of you at the masters level’, so if this is a mid-career change for you and you expect your instructors to teach you what you need to know because thats what you are paying them to do….you wont receive that service.
-Subject Pass or Fail is informed 1 week prior to next semester starting. Class enrollment commences 6 months prior to that due to class frequency offering and class fullness (x50 students per class – delivered online/remote is generally the case), so plan your life accordingly.
-Online Cyber Range rarely works and offline VM’s are heavily relied upon. Some exams are held in the cloud and submissions must be submitted off the cloud – so if you have a 2.5 hour window you must manually type and successfully deliver on your exploits, then manually type them offline to be submitted into the LMS system, as file transfers are never enabled and never will be, so budget your time accordingly.
-This is a military university campus. It is literally written in the name and is hosted on a military base. The instructors do not understand 24h time and are unsympathetic to military life – which is genuinely different to civilian life. Trying to appeal to them is like appealing to a brick wall.
-Assessment windows are not consistent. One instructor will open an assessment on a Friday from 0850 – 2359 when others will open an assessment on Friday 0800 to Sunday 2355 and others from Monday 0800 to Sunday 2359 – again, sometimes in 12 hour time and when it is possible to set a ‘window’ to complete one or two attempts (as the instructor sees fit) I cannot see why there cannot be consistency in the larger attempt window and the ability to use 24hr time.
-Labs/Lectures/Instructions are entirely incorrect. Most of your time will be spent decrypting/decyperhing inaccurate or inadequate lab/lecture/assessment instructions. You will not be compensated for this lost time within the exam window, and you cannot appeal this afterwards.
-It is said that you dont need to know any coding languages within this program – until you need to know Assembly, C or Python – and you will be shown the basics of Assembly and tested to the highest levels of Python. So definitely know those 3 – which is a good 15 year pipeline if you follow industry standards.
-University pushes the need for timely and accurate feedback, which I am sure they do nothing with. If you require timely and accurate feedback on your assessment pieces – forget about it.
This is a cash cow, and a poor degree at best. Please consider whether or not this univeristy and program is for you when making this choice.
–
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Emily
Worst uni ever, do NOT study here.
Worst uni ever, do NOT study here.
I am completing a bachelor of secondary education here at UNSW and it was the worst decision to study here. Every teacher is unsupportive and poorly equipped. The university as a whole offers minimal to no support and often leaves their students stranded with zero guidance. I often get locked out of crucial websites if I have not paid hundred dollar bills on time. The uni failed to place me at a school for my first placement which resulted in my completing it late and caused me immense stress and anxiety. When I email the admin for support, I often don’t receive replies or receive replies months later.
It truly is a money scheme, I do not recommend ever enrolling into this uni.
M
If you can, go to another university
As a domestic student, I am disappointed with the whole university.
There is a handful of lecturers who are decent but I found most of them are average at best. The youtube tutorials are far more effective at teaching the content than the uni lecturers. So, what is the point of spending thousands of dollars on the course, If I can teach them myself? The tutorials on youtube get to the main points in 15 minutes whilst the lecturers drag on for few hours and I still don’t understand them!
It feels very impersonal studying here. I transferred from the ANU because my partner lives in Sydney and in hindsight, I kind of regret it. UNSW is run like a business and I found its approach to teaching and education itself to be lacking and, at best dismal. It’s only interested in rankings and profits. It doesn’t reinvest that back into improving the student learning experience. In one of the recent QILT surveys, UNSW had the lowest student satisfaction out of all the Group of 8 universities(~65$%). Red flag. This place’s reputation is rapidly coming down, you would be blind not to see it.
Honestly, UNSW should stop pretending to be a public university. It should register as a public company in the education sector, listed on the ASX stock exchange. I doubt the uni admins cares about those survey results as long as the money keeps coming in. After all, it is UN$W. It always comes up with innovative ways to cut costs and diversify its revenue streams(trimester? UNSW Singapore? ICAS?? among many other BS). I’m observing a lot of BMWs and Teslas at the staff car parks these days whilst there is a lack of studying space on campus. This is the kind of trade-offs the uni is willing to make – at the expense of students who actually want to study here. I kid you not, one of my lecturers explicitly said in a class that he will buy a new BMW after the course finished when one of the student asked about the consequence of failing his class. Jeez! Students are treated as IDs, you don’t really ‘exist’ here.
I’m giving it two stars, one because some students here are genuinely talented, but I feel that was in spite of the uni not because of it(they already learned the materials beforehand or have smart friends). Another star because it still maintains high standards for graduating, especially if you are aiming for Distinctions or High Distinctions.
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Student
UNSW changed from 2 to 3 terms per year. It’s an outright money grabbing experiment that’s failing miserably. Everything is packed in as short a time as possible. The quicker they get you out the door the more fees students they can get money from. It’s bad for student learning and puts extra work on staff. Course reviews are worse, which they conveniently bad for covid. Yet UNSW insists on continuing with it, because otherwise would be to admit wrong. There have been so many failed “strategies” (remember UNSW Singapore?) that’s a money waster and swept under the carpet. There’s absolutely no student culture/life/vibe. People just want to pass, get their degree and get a job.
If you’re also working there as a tutor, you would’ve been exploited for years. They’ve admitted to underpayment of casuals but that’s an issue that’s been raised for years. Yet they did nothing about it until the government (Fair Work Ombudsman) is investigating. You eventually get a letter about the underpayment that’s deliberately vague and doesn’t tell you what you were underpaid and when you ask questions or raise further underpayments you’re just ignored. So much for engaging and cooperating with or respecting casual employees. Keeping student casuals ignorant about their entitlements and preventing casuals from assessing their backpay benefits them just fine, because underpaying employees risk huge penalties/compensation that would be payable to employees.
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April
Not worth the money and time
I am currently studying for a Graduate Diploma in Psychology. The course is quite disappointing because the quality of teaching is bad, and not worth the money. Some lectures were taught years ago. Some teachers’ accents are hard to understand which means students need to rely on not accurate transcripts. Most of all, some tutors were mean in grading assessments. They demonstrated high prejudice in teaching. I don’t know what they are so proud of. Please, please, please consider three times before signing up.
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Simon Kozlina
my experience studying law at unsw
my experience studying law at unsw was not good. the lecturers were really bad at teaching. students were left to teach themselves. the was particularly evident in the the private law contract streams. to make things even worse, some of the teachers were overly enthusiastic with vested interest for their own approval ratings rather than prioritising students’ learning. tutorials often turn into a disorderly shouting and match for petty participation marks. overall was so disappointed and will forever regret my choice to study here.
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A
DEFINITELY not worth the money
I’m currently studying an online course in Data Science at UNSW, and the course materials are an absolute joke. The tutorials on Khan Academy are way, way better. Seriously. The content is sloppily written, with unclear/fuzzy/random pictures that are cut from google and not properly explained. For example, I’m currently looking at a picture of a graph, and NONE of the dimensions or functions on the graph are mentioned in the accompanying material. Wtf not?? Because the staff are underpaid and overworked, and they don’t have time to write properly engaging lessons.
On top of that, despite the PLETHORA of online collaboration and meeting options these days, there is literally not one single opportunity for students to meet each other and chat online. There are the official learning platform forums, but they do NOT feel friendly or welcoming, they are simply for technical questions about the course content. There are ‘tutorials’ each week, but they just involve the tutor speaking for an hour into silence. I have never had a single student discussion in any one of my tutes. The most that happens is an occasional question typed into the chat box. There is no space or opportunity given to discuss the material or problems with our peers, and definitely no chance to get to know anybody or form connections.
The lecturers have all been lovely.
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Gail B
Totally agree
I am currently doing a GradDip of Psychology and agree with you 💯. It’s incredible how their teaching standards are negatively related to their assessment demands! I got a really low mark in my first assessment and agree – their marking is too harsh. I already got accepted in a different uni (Commonwealth sponsored place) and will wave goodbye to this dodgy money making course . BTW, I know who/what you mean when you say about the accent- it’s pure torture!
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Peigeng Sun
Do not bother, just go to another one
It used to be the day when UNSW was the top uni for engineering in NSW but nowadays it is terrible. Thanks to trimesters, Uni timetables stretched out longer, which means; less time to socialise with friends from any other Uni as every holiday period begins and ends at a different time, Uni lecturers are incredibly unhelpful as they too are stressed out due to staff cuts and having to change entire courses to shorten them and cram them into overall shorter lecture times, and also enjoy the quickly declining reputation (that is why you probably even considered going here in the first place), after all, who chose UNSW for fun or a nice campus when there is USYD, UOW and UTS or even WSU. This is not the Uni for you under ANY circumstance, unless you enjoy pain and suffering.
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Ari
ARTS - Theatre and Performance / French
I completed a Bachelor of Arts – Major in Theatre and Performance, Minor in French. (I graduated before the Trimesters came in)
The theatre department was quite underfunded and the professors and people in this field were often stressed about it, which is a shame because I felt the teachers and staff were of high quality, very supportive, and were very engaged in the courses they taught. The theatre course is really great for those who like practical components but are more interested in theory, history and performance criticism. I would not recommend it for those who wish to pursue a career as a performer…
The french teachers were all native speakers and they went an extra mile to try to get the students engaged (unfortunately, my classmates went the extra 2 miles to avoid speaking french). It was a difficult subject but if you put in the work that the teachers recommend and help provide, it actually would be easy…
I felt the career counselling staff quite ok. Not amazing as they weren’t specialists in particular industries.
The Kensington Campus is fine, I found numerous nooks and study places both indoors, outdoors, with a view or with ‘dining’, I enjoyed choosing where to study according to my mood and needs. The food was not cheaper, but I thought there were some good options for taste. The other services were convenient and easily accessible.
The Exchange Program was the biggest headache and major stress as the process was not easy and the staff appeared overworked (it seems their automated application systems were out of date or not actually helpful to anyone). However, it all got easier once I got to my exchange uni, and settling things when I got back was so easy and kind of sketchy (to my advantage).
In short, the course was average, the teachers and staff are fantastic but the department resources were poor (there have been further budget cuts to their department since I left). The students were… students, I expected more enthusiasm from them.
The Campus was fine and nice, motorbike/scooter parking is great, don’t try with a car, public transport depends. Easy to get fit with the stairs and if you have to run from lower to upper campus between classes. Unfortunately I cannot make comment about the effects of Trimesters…
David B
University in distress
This now appears to be a university in distress.
Phones are not answering, testamurs are not being issued for completed students.
Everything shrieks total chaos, from the non-responsive online interfaces, failing phone systems, emails not being responded to and on-hold student inquiries through to the university switchboard sending calls to non-phones. No-one responds to anything. Have been trying for 3 weeks for a response regarding verifying an engineering student is fit to employ and no-one is home, just automated systems and a switchboard operator manning a broken system.
Would issue zero stars if i could
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Caitlin
Don't bother if you're disabled
I don’t think this is a university which is set up to help disabled people succeed.
I became seriously physically and mentally ill during my first year to the point where I was too ill to complete my classes or attend exams. I was suspended, and I obviously appealed this because I did not intend to get sick. This was out of my control. Despite proving I had worked to completely change my circumstances to put myself in a good space, the suspension was upheld, because the uni “did not believe they could offer the required support”.
Can’t praise the residential colleges admin enough though.
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Sam
check map
Check out this review of UNSW Sydney on Google Maps
https://goo.gl/maps/uXgsYCLmooxrBdqe8
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Lauren
Master of Art Curating
Hi peeps, kinda need help here. I am considering to take Master of Art Curating and Cultural Leadership (MCCL). Anyone has taken the art major here? is it worth it? Also I am wondering whether students need to pay tuition fees for the credits during Internship?
GR
Was a great uni but things have changed
Did Science honours and Computer Science postgrad over the last 8 years. In short, teaching staff is great but student admin such as financial admin and student experience teams are a big negative.
They have profited off the health situation by delaying announcements after financial census date and academic census date. This is intended to leave no avenue for students to get refunds at all since they won’t adjust fee remission circumstances for COVID. They have also cherry-picked withdrawal options by extending academic census date from 29 March to 28 April while keeping financial census date the same to lock in your fees.
Student Admin also paints the idea of flexibility by moving to a trimester calendar when in reality, it has limited the opportunities for students. For example, internships with big companies are not easily negotiable as most would require you to start sometime in November while exam period under a trimester calendar does not end until mid December. Good luck asking companies to push your start date for a whole month! As a cherry on top, the trimester calendar has left the uni so inflexible to any disruptions that they can’t afford to suspend teaching for even a week since it will directly cut into another term. It really takes an unworldly imagination from Student Admin to fabricate such fantasies of flexibility and opportunity when they don’t even speak from student experience.
Another example of the inconvenience of student admin is intentionally hindering the courses you can claim as transfer credit. A popular course such as Master of IT in CSE for those wanting to break into data analytics. They will only recognise transfer credit for certain courses such as AI, intro courses to programming, comp networks, databases and project management. This means if you did heavily comp sci courses at another uni or even other unsw courses with the same course codes they ask for in the handbook, if it doesn’t falling into one of those 5 or 6 courses then you won’t get transfer credit. Another method to force course intake and fees.
Aside from the emphasis on profit, there is a lot of truth around the stereotype on the abundance of international students. Using the Master of IT as an example, a compulsory course is project management which traditionally includes a group project for students in a cohort of 300 to 400. Walk into the first lecture and you will find the overwhelming demographics to be international students (>90%). The challenge comes from preparing your assessment submissions with English-challenged students who are sure to not have met language proficiency requirements. Combine this with the usual sloths in group work and you’ll cook up 10 weeks of misery and frustration that makes you question your choice in studying at this university.
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Sanjay
Can somebody please help me. Its really urgent.
Hi
Can somebody please help me. Its really urgent.
I am an international student from India who got admitted to the Master of Telecommunication engineering program at UNSW. The program is a non-accredited program. Can somebody please educate me on what this non-accreditation means. My whole purpose for masters is to do a job in Australia and go for PR.
As the program is non-accredited, I really don’t know what does this mean and will it be a problem for me in securing a job and PR in Australia. Is this program any worth pursuing?
Thanks in advance.
Jay
Hi Sanjay,
There is the Master of Engineering at UNSW which is accredited and the Master of Engineering Science which is not. Accreditation in Australia is through Engineers Australia (under the Washington Accord), its a professional recognition for the degree.
The Master of Engineering Science is people who have already completed a 4-year Engineering degree at undergraduate level and therefore do not need to become accredited. The course is more flexible for students, with more control over the electives they choose. Students can decide to become very specialised in a specific area or broaden their engineering knowledge.
The Master of Engineering is usually for students that have come from a 3 year engineering UG degree, or a non-accredited engineering degree. This course is more rigid, with less choice for students as it has to meet accreditation requirements.
Most Australian students will be doing the Master of Engineering Science as they would have already come from an accredited UG degree. So check your background and see if you already have accredited from your UG degree.
Both degrees will get you a job, UNSW is known for Engineering and the Master of Engineering Science is their biggest program. It is still possible to get accreditation after your degree by applying directly to Engineers Australia (you will need some work experience). I don’t know if accreditation affects PR, i doubt it. You will still receive you post study work rights and will be highly employable. If you can find sponsorship in the 2 years after graduating in a job that appears of the skills list then it shouldn’t be a problem.
Subir Saha
Dear Sanjay-my advice to you is very genuine.If you are coming to UNSW or Australia just to earn a PR or a job in Australia,you will be highly disappointed.Come here to get a high graded education which means to grind your butt with lot of researching yourself.Your passion should be to get a quality education.May be you shall be disappointed by the quality that is delivered to you but do not think of PR/job as an immediate result.The PR/Job,you may get,but only if can bring laurels through your education.Hope you get the point.
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Judy
Hi Sanjay,
A non-accredited program means that the engineering profession does recognise this course as an acceptable course of study. You will not be able to find a job in that profession using this degree alone unless you do another accredited degree afterwards.
Please don’t do a non-accredited degree unless you know what you’re getting yourself into!
Jack Nugent
Master of Commerce--please help!
Hi, I’m considering taking Master of Commerce at UNSW. Can anyone comment on the student experience? I heard that international student to domestic student ratio is bad. Also, I heard that lecturers force english speaking students into groups with other poorer english speaking students to bring the whole group up. e.g. 1 english speaker and 3-4 international students to a group. This sounds terrible. Is there truth to this? Any other comments regarding the experience? Thank you so much!
T
I am considering going to Australia to study Computer Science and struggling to choose between Unimelb and UNSW for my Bachelor of Science. Unimelb has a higher rank than UNSW but people are saying UNSW is better for computer science. Can anyone help me choose?
Sam
UNSW or Uni Mel undergrad
Following. Please advise any reviews or facts that could help
A
The downside of studying at UNSW
I did a science degree at UNSW and graduated with Honours approximately 3 years ago. In my opinion, most of professors, tutors and demonstrators are amazing – I learned a lot from them, except for some. Most of the students that studied at UNSW are also high achievers.
I truly believe that UNSW would be an excellent University if they hired the right staffs, particularly all the admins. This includes FINANCIAL admins, admins involved with student enrolments and faculty admins (ALL faculties). I really hope that UNSW will find a time to review their staffs, especially ones that are involved in administration.
Another negative input from me is the unbelievably expensive books (had to pay $10 for 15 blank page book with just a “laboratory manual” title on the cover page)/ tuition fees/ foods/ parking/ any price that the university charged to us students. We are only students – we have no money. Also, by the time we graduate we are still liable for HECS, and this is only if we got a job. There are lots of graduates I knew from my year who had no luck in finding jobs (maybe thousands of new graduates in reality). Please give us mercy!
Last but not least, also a negative feedback from me is that I believe the university has not used the income they have received from students wisely. Instead of using their income for research (eg. Buy or replace broken lab equipments), the University bought themselves new Tesla. You won’t believe how many Teslas UNSW has until you see it for yourself at the car park.
UNSW is a good University to study and I am sure you will enjoy studying here as long as you do not create problems with the staffs or work in the lab (sometimes the idea about Tesla being prioritised over research can be irritating – I thought I spent big money for my tuition fee, their service, to make me smarter?).
Nevertheless, after studying medicine course at the University of Melbourne, I will definitely prefer and would strongly recommend the University of Melbourne over UNSW as I think they are very organised (if you have interest in moving to Melbourne). The difference is like heaven and earth!
I really hope that those 3 main issues with UNSW mentioned above can be fixed.
Did you find this review helpful? Yes (38)No (2)
Miya
Question/comment- not a review
Hi A,
I am currently considering studying health/medical sciences at both UNSW and Melbourne University. I found your review helpful and I was wondering if you could expand upon the differences between the universities, especially in your field. That would be hugely appreciated, thanks!
M
Ben
Master of War Studies
Hi I am interested in studying the Master of War Studies online through UNSW at ADFA. Has anyone studied here? Is it a good course and online platform and would you recommend it? Thanks 🙏 so much really appreciate it!
S
Hi peeps,
I am thinking of joining this Uni for my Master of eduction (special ed). Has anyone taken this up?
I am seeing a lot of bad reviews for other Universities (Sydney, ACU, Griffith) and this has just the one.
Please help me decide.
V
I’m currently studying B. Environmental management, which is a natural science course. I’m majoring in Earth science (basically geology).
This review is only really going to apply to the department of BEES (esp. my major) and general campus life.
Even thought UTS has a reputation for being “hands-on”, I find my courses pretty hands on. We keep getting field trips and fieldwork chucked at us. It’s pretty sweet. You’re basically forced to make friends because of it.
A lot of emphasis is put on learning the basics of computer programs that we’ll probably use when we enter the science industry.
In natural science, group work is also generally less painful. Everyone wants to be there, so they have to pitch in. (No one is there for the prestige, or the money.) The peeps in my cohort at are quite friendly. But then again my cohort is quite small so if someone’s an ass, everyone would know…
ARC is cool; the clubs and societies are also cool. I can see how they’d be quite fun, but it’s…not like I go to club meetings and events.
All the lecturers & professors are very approachable. Most of them seem to know what they’re doing and have pretty good senses of humour. At least science lecturers don’t seem to teach out of a textbook. Volunteering with lecturers is always encouraged.
The campus is lovely, if you ignore the Basser steps. Seriously, if you don’t like climbing stairs, UNSW may not be the uni for you (maybe check it out before you enrol).
Food on campus is on average pretty sucky. The Quad foodcourt, the 2 uni bars & Subway have some decent stuff, but nothing is really cheap.
University transport varies. The bus ride can be annoying. The various buses from Central/Green Square are 15-30 min. Don’t go to UNSW if you hate buses. Personally I read or play my 3ds on the bus.
Overall, if I had to choose, I’d say I like this uni. The atmosphere is nice. I don’t really feel alone even when I am. Classes are cool. Content is ace. Though I guess it would depend on what you’re studying.
Well, I guess I’d recommend UNSW to anyone interested in Bio/Geo/Enviro science 🙂