Welcome back to another blog!
This post will attempt to go over some of the most important parts you need to know (from my experience) about the Semester one courses of Part II!
basic overview
So, the one thing in common that you will have across these courses is that you’ll be taking all four with other Engsci- AND all the BMEs! (otherwise all the courses are really different :))
You also may have heard that we get a lot of electives in Engsci. Sorry, that’s only in Semester 2 (you’ll get 2- unless you’re doing a conjoint where you’ll only get 1).
233
Basically the token coding course of the semester. Most people from the years above will tell you that this course was almost literally traumatizing but we were the lucky year! (they made the labs much easier for us! yay!- but also this means I’m not sure what the difficulty of your labs will be…sorry…)
You will have regular labs throughout the semester (much like 131), a test and an exam. The labs are alright, and you code in Python. HOWEVER! there are some parts of 233 that deal with hardware (we played with BBC microbits), and facts about hardware (like latency and whatnot) which was a massive jump scare for me. Don’t let that stop you from taking Engsci though, it was only a small part. Looking back at it, maybe that topic was kind of fun…or not.
I feel like this course was a super shallow overview of all things coding + computer (in the sense that we covered a lot but not in a lot of depth). For example, we learnt about Object Oriented Programming (OOP), but not the concept of inheritance. We learnt about hardware but only really played with BBC microbits (see Figure 1).
Overall, it was a great learning experience and you get a taste of everything. (good to figure out what you like- or don’t like!)
211
ENGSCI211 is the sequel to ENGSCI111. Plus, you take this course with everyone else in Part II, so it’s like flashbacks to Part I and struggle through 211 assignments together like you did before : D
Apart from the expected algebra and equations in 211, there’s also this DA (Data Analysis) section, which is perfect for Engsci. DA is going to be a very prominent part of a typical Engsci’s life, plus you learn some of the content already in 255 >:)
Oh, and you use this really really cool and swag and so fun language called R. Which is really really fun.
255
This is the only paper that you won’t be taking with BME, and for good reason. ENGSCI255/STATS255 is basically a statistics paper, you learn a lot about modelling and optimisation. To be very honest, this was probably my favourite paper.
The content was super useful if you want to go into data analysis and/or optimisation or modelling. My only issue with this paper is the massive (4) amount of assignments (which they already reduced from the last years..)
A lot of the things that you learn in 255 sounds really cool like, linear programming or project management or decision making or queues. Okay maybe ‘queues’ doesn’t sound that cool but the other things are pretty interesting to learn. And I feel like this course teaches you a lot of different things that you’ll use in Semester Two (omg spoiler!) and other things that are actually pretty relevant to real-life situations.
221
Okay. Imagine the lovechild between CHEMMAT121, ENGGEN140 and ENGGEN121. That’s basically what BIOMENG221 is.
As bad as it may sound, the content for this course was really fun. I won’t spoil too much of the content for you guys 😉 but it really is enjoyable. Just make sure that you keep up with the lectures because those stack up and the lectures are usually pretty packed with content too. You’ll have three assignments for the three sections, two tests and a final exam!
The three sections as I remember them are:
- Fluid mechanics and Bernoulli’s equation (ENGGEN121 x ENGGEN140)
- Stress and Strain and Stressed (CHEMMAT121)
- An alternate delivery of ENGGEN121 (which was surprisingly a lot more fun than actual ENGGEN121)
The best part about 221 is they give you an amazing sheet of what to know, what to not know (called study guide). Literally saved my LIFE
go forth and slay <3
Hopefully this blog helped you kind of figure out what we study in Engsci and narrowed down your options!