User Experience Design MSc at Kingston University - 100% true student experience

 This is my first English blog, thanks to Kingston University for inspiring me to do so.

I wrote this article in the hope that everyone can have a better learning experience and make better choices, and Kingston University must also make efforts to improve its teaching quality

Let me begin by stating my conclusion. If I had a second chance, I would not choose Kingston University to study User Experience Design. Although I have met very good friends and professors here, I also believe that everything happens for a reason, however, for someone who knew she wanted to study abroad since childhood and has been saving money since working, coming to Kingston to study completely ruined my once-in-a-lifetime study abroad life.

 In a nutshell, this school does not treat all students equally as it claims, and has the worst administrative efficiency I have ever seen, I even received a few unprofessional and unfriendly emails from the administrative staff. Also,the faculty I studied at accepted more than 170 students, but there were no corresponding resources and equipments to give each student a good learning experience. Kingston University seems to invest most of its money on KSA. When it comes to UX faculty, there are essentially no resources available. You may consider Goldsmiths or City, University of London, in the London area for about the same tuition fees. According to friends studying in these two universities, the communities there are very supportive.

Please continue reading if you have time~

{Note: The following experience is based on the study experience in 2022. There is no guarantee that the school will remain the same or that it will change in the future. Be sure to contact the alumni who graduated recently to confirm if the situation is the same.}

#Some neutral facts

 

1. There is no need to select courses, everyone has the same module

2. You will learn about the entire Design Thinking process, as well as some aspects of user interface design and human-computer interaction(HCI). There is no particular inclination toward UX learning here, and it is relatively uniform.

3. The supervisor may not be a school professor, but someone with extensive practical experience (relatively non-academic).

4. Most of the classmates are from India and China.

5.While preparing assignments, all of us couldn't sleep for more than 24 hours, and we only slept 4-5 hours a day, for 2-3 weeks. I've worked 8 years and I've never been so tired. If you're only going to dawdle, this isn't for you.

 
#The frustrating part of the course

1. An excess of accepted students

If a professor has to teach a module to 170＋ students, how can the quality of the course be high? Professors frequently do not respond to our questions for days, or they even forget to respond. It is also embarrassing for me to urge the professor since I am aware that they have many questions to answer. A classroom of 170＋ people often makes it difficult to hear what the professor is saying or listen and see people’s presantation.

 

2. Learning styles that can be improved

Each module will have a workshop for us to implement, but no one will stare at you to see if you are doing it right. Even though the TA is available for questions at any time, a group of students with no experience does not have any idea if there is a problem. There will be revisions to the works afterward, but the people making the changes are different every time, and some feedbacks were really just a formality.

 

3. Disorganized and chaotic system

Occasionally, the professor only informs the students of the guidelines a few days before the deadline, which causes students a great deal of trouble. Besides,all of the teaching materials are not unified in one place, and we spend a great deal of time looking for them.It was really annoying and time-wasting.

4.Too few resources

It does not appear that this school has any resources related to user experience for their students, and no good relationships with industry can be observed. There will not be many opportunities for collaboration with the industry, and many job openings will not be advertised.My friend who studied at UCL said her dissertation was to work directly with clients, and the school would send them job vacancies.So you really need to be strong by youself. There are almost no speeches, events, or activities outside of the classroom.. The students all go home after class, so it is difficult to interact with others. If you do not pay extra effort, it is extremely difficult to become friends with your classmates since there are not many group projects.

5.Too few professors

You will meet no more than five professors in the faculty. The fact that there are less than 50 students in other UX schools, that there are more than 10 professors who specialize in different fields that can be consulted, and that there are opportunities to go to bars with professors to discuss research and life makes me very envious! During my studies at Kingston University, I have noticed that the teacher-student relationship is not very close. I believe the main reason for this is that there are too many students.

6.There are too many restrictions on the placement year

There is a placement year at this school, which is an advantage, but it must be found by the student themselves. There are many restrictions on placement, and the school is only able to provide general employment assistance. People tell me that there are very few people who can find it, and because the school requires a fee that is more expensive than PSW, most people simply give up.

7.Only a few feedbacks have been received after the assignment

Even though I appreciate the fact that the assignments I hand in can serve as a portfolio, I only received a few sentences of feedback after a month's worth of work, which makes it difficult for me to learn and grow from it. It would be helpful if there were more specific and helpful feedback. Some markers outside the school even give me the impression that I have received a random grade, for example: my comment is "nice work", but my score is 60, which is obviously not a good score. Again, I believe this also caused by accepting too many students.

8. You need to learn software 100% by yourself

I agree and support that software requires self-learning, but when we need consultation, we can only use Google, the school does not have any resources to assist us. Furthermore, this "design" faculty did not purchase any software commonly used by students. Any software that you require will have to be purchased by you.

 

9.What happened to my two coursemates was..... one was withdrawn without reason and postponed to the next intake, and the other was notified she had been accepted before uploading the required documents. Our feeling is that the school didn't strictly select students.

#Good parts of the course

 

1. The modules each help you to produce actual works, so when you graduate, you can have more than three portfolios, and you don't have to make another portfolio (but the feedback that the professors offer is usually too brief, you may need to ask some professionals for more improvement).

 

2. There are many external lecturers who have rich practical experience in the industry, and have worked in big companies such as IBM, which is very good for students to learn from them.

 

3. Sometimes in class, industry professionals will be invited to share the current situation of the industry

 

4. The school seems to be very keen on hiring its students. If you can't find a job, maybe you can come back to school and work as a TA(?)

 

5. If there are a lot of graduates... Maybe there will be a lot of alumni resources? (I'm not sure about this either, since there weren't many alumni sharing work openings or internal referrals  during my study period)

 

6. You will not be left alone to complete your dissertation by your supervisors.

 

 

Outside of Class

 

 
#The frustrating part of the school

 

1. I wouldn't recommend enrolling in January. I wouldn't recommend living in the school accommodation if you're enrolling in January! There's no fair treatment as it claims for all students at this Kingston University. Admission is in January and September, but only  September intake students get the student accommodation treatment of "surely can live for a whole year". My hall license can only be signed until September, so what do I do after September? The school didn't care about me at all! I could not focus on my study because I needed to spend extra time doing house viewing, moving out and moving into a new place. It takes lot of time!!

In the UK, it's hard to sign short-term housing contracts.

I've complained to the school that we pay the same as students enrolled in September, why aren't we guaranteed the same? We were ignored by the school.

 

2.Their administrative efficiency is terrible, and they reply to emails very slowly (Maybe not every department, but at least many I have been contacted with). From their replies, I can tell that employees don't care about their work and push things off! A staff even forgot to attach a document I need for 3 times.

(I've contacted other schools like Loughborough/Goldsmith before. Many schools respond quickly and enthusiastically, so I can really feel the difference in how they respond to the letter. The feeling of "willingness to help" is really much worse. very sad, isn't it! ) 

 

3 Unfriendly Attitude

Once I sent an Email to the accommodation team but did not write clearly the requirements, they replied to me: "You seem to have not read our email carefully." I think they could have just told me what I needed to know, and there was no need to accuse me of not doing things right at the beginning of the Email. Instead of focusing on the thing itself, they take it personally.

 

Also. I once asked for documents for opening an account, and they gave me the wrong ones. When I wrote and asked for it again, they replied in 3 times the size of the letter and said, "you can download it yourself" , which was very rude to me.

 

4.Please think twice if you plan to live in student accommodation. As a result of living with undergraduates, it is easy to quarrel with each other, and we have to deal with a lot of crazy and loud undergraduates students. The priority of the two groups (undergraduate and postgraduate students) is too different. The school should not let these two groups live together. Also, people enter the room without warning to check things all the time (I lived in Seething Wells) . In the first few days,I wanted to know why there are always footprints in my room that aren't mine. That's really scary.

 

5.While I like the placement team quite a lot, to be honest, whether you're looking for an internship, volunteer opportunity, or job, Kingston University has very few resources, so you have to work hard!

 

6. It's expensive to stay or eat in Kingston.

 

7.The school's Wifi is super bad, you can only surf the Internet but not do video call.

 

 

#Good parts 

 

1. It's a beautiful library. In the distance, you can see the woods and Hampton Palace. If you stay up late in the library, you can take a shower. It comes with a Dyson hair dryer.

 

2. You can do woodworking, pottery, etc. in Art School to cultivate your body and mind

 

3. There are a lot of big parks near the school. Wild deers roam the park. Take a walk and see the animals if you're feeling down!

 

4. The language classes are free (Korean, Spanish, Arabic, French, etc.) but it's hard to progress! After all, it's only once a week

 

5. Korea Town is close (you have to take a bus for about 30 minutes), there's a Korean supermarket nearby, and you can eat Bingsoo at K-town.

 

6. Despite being dirty, you can play water sports on the Thames, which is great in summer!

 

7. It's close to central London. You can get to Waterloo by train in 20 minutes, but famous attractions take about 40 minutes.

 

8. The nearby life functions are perfect, there's lots of bubble tea shops

 

9. It's very safe in Kingston, I often walk home from the library late at night

 

10. There's a lot of friendly staff in the Information Center, but I'm not sure about the rest.

 

11. If you can live in a tiny place, some of Kingston University's student accommodation is actually very cheap (the cheapest is 115 a week), and they've just been renovated.

 

I know I've written a lot. It would be great if Kingston University could improve itself, and everyone deserves more transparency. My sincere hope is that everyone will be able to have a good postgraduate experience and obtain a good UX-related job after graduation! 

Thanks for your reading.