UCD Msc Project Management vs UL Msc Project Management

Keviv

Hi guys, i am interested in joining Msc Project Management. Now i have two choices in University of Limerick and University College Dublin. UL program is accredited by Project Management Institute (PMI GAC) which is very good for PM courses and priced at 12000 EUR, whereas UCD is triple accredited business school and ranked better in Ireland and worldwide. UCD is charging 18300 EUR. I am confused which one to choose , please help me.

ironclaw

I undertook a part time MSc with UCD in Smurfit but not the course you are looking at. If I can give you some advice:

- If you are doing it part time, make sure you have the time to spare, are self motivated and willing to put the sacrafice in. It can be a tough slog for two years and if you find it hard to find time now, you'll need to be finding 1 to 2 hours during the day each day and more on the weekends to keep pace.

- Check the course work, each individual module, and see if they interest you. Luckily for me it was all very interesting but some courses have some weird and wonderful additions that are truly shockingly outdated. Speak with the lecturer if you can and get some feedback from students (See below)

- Talk with present and former students. I can't stress this enough. Had I done so, I doubt I would have done it. Our course had and continues to have serious problems. Really bad organisation, comically so from a business school, and rather poor lecturer choices. Some had never been in industry yet are lecturing like they took a company to an IPO and back. I'd say out of the 3 or 4 modules per sememster, at least 1 was with a very poor lecturer. Pretty poor for a double digit investment from us as students. Feedback was slow and it really felt like 'Well, you paid your money and we'll give you a piece of paper with our name on it in 2 years' I didn't see a single reactive piece of feedback the entire time. Ultimately, UCD is like a state run institution, its all back patting and blame shifting.

- Check your job prospects, current and future. There is a lot of weight being placed on experience now over academic creditals (Simple as we are churning out so many graduates with a Masters or more) so you need to ask yourself if you invest 18kEUR now, what is it going to be worth to you in 2 years? Simply put, you'd want to make back that 18k in the two following years if you really want to extract value from it. 18kEUR would go a long way towards diplomas, night courses and CPD for example.

If you have any general questions about the school, I'll try answer!

Keviv

Hi Ironclaw,

Thanks for your reply. I am based in India and yes looking for full time Msc PM program. If you dont mind can i ask you what course you did in UCD ? . Like you said i already checked modules in both universities and liked it, thats why zeroed  UCD and Limerick. The thing is i heard good things about both Limerick and UCD, both these programs can be found in Eduniversal rankings for Engineering and Project Management. I am really confused to chose between this two. My initial thought is to go for Limerick as is it way cheaper than UCD and accredited from PMI, but i am worried about employment opportunities in Limerick. Dublin is way more superior for IT related jobs.

ironclaw

Keviv wrote: »

Hi Ironclaw,

Thanks for your reply. I am based in India and yes looking for full time Msc PM program. If you dont mind can i ask you what course you did in UCD ? . Like you said i already checked modules in both universities and liked it, thats why zeroed  UCD and Limerick. The thing is i heard good things about both Limerick and UCD, both these programs can be found in Eduniversal rankings for Engineering and Project Management. I am really confused to chose between this two. My initial thought is to go for Limerick as is it way cheaper than UCD and accredited from PMI, but i am worried about employment opportunities in Limerick. Dublin is way more superior for IT related jobs.

I wouldn't worry too much about the rankings,both universities are highly ranked. However, if you wanted to be very structured, UCD would edge ahead in business, even more so with the Michael Smurfit school. It would be the Irish equivalent of Stanford or Harvard for an MBA.

With regards to PMI certification, you can always do this as a stand alone course or the myriad of others methodologies e.g Six Sigma, Lean or whatever the 'hot topic' is. Really, project experience will weigh a lot more for you so whilst PMI may be a nice to have on a CV, I wouldn't call it essential if you ran some very successful projects.

Your cost of living would be lower in Limerick as would you rent. But Ireland on the whole isn't exactly cheap to live so I'd do your homework there as well. Likewise, depending on your background, you may find it hard to land a job with 'just' project management. If you had an IT or Engineering mix as well, it would greatly improve your odds.

Lastly, Limerick is only 2 hours out of Dublin. We're tiny as a nation goes so even if you studied in Limerick, you arn't confining yourself to that location for the long term. Job prospects would be marginally better in Dublin but Limerick and Galway are also IT centers and again, your talking 90 mins away for Galway at most.

Keviv

Ironclaw,

I am an IT guy with B Tech(IT) and MIS (Australia) degree with over 5 years of work experience in IT industry. My initial idea is to go for MBA, but it is too costly for my liking, finally i zeroed on project management domain and also it is quite close to business analysis domain(my current role). So going by your reply i think its okay to study in Limerick. Now my only question is does  brand UCD makes any difference in landing a job there in Ireland ?, i know its entirely based on my profile and ability to crack interviews , but if studying in UCD improves my chance of getting a job its better to take it right ? .

ironclaw

Keviv wrote: »

Ironclaw,

I am an IT guy with B Tech(IT) and MIS (Australia) degree with over 5 years of work experience in IT industry. My initial idea is to go for MBA, but it is too costly for my liking, finally i zeroed on project management domain and also it is quite close to business analysis domain(my current role). So going by your reply i think its okay to study in Limerick. Now my only question is does  brand UCD makes any difference in landing a job there in Ireland ?, i know its entirely based on my profile and ability to crack interviews , but if studying in UCD improves my chance of getting a job its better to take it right ? .

With your experience, it won't matter where you studied in my opinion. Is there any reason you are doing another Masters when you already have one? A second would be of little additional merit when you could do a lot of CPD or Diploma course(s) for half the budget of a Masters.

Lastly, with your experience, you'd be mad to come to Ireland. You could land likely 3 to 4 times the salary in the US or Canada if you could get a visa sponsor and its the route I'd be taking.

Keviv

ironclaw wrote: »

Keviv wrote: »

Ironclaw,

I am an IT guy with B Tech(IT) and MIS (Australia) degree with over 5 years of work experience in IT industry. My initial idea is to go for MBA, but it is too costly for my liking, finally i zeroed on project management domain and also it is quite close to business analysis domain(my current role). So going by your reply i think its okay to study in Limerick. Now my only question is does  brand UCD makes any difference in landing a job there in Ireland ?, i know its entirely based on my profile and ability to crack interviews , but if studying in UCD improves my chance of getting a job its better to take it right ? .

With your experience, it won't matter where you studied in my opinion. Is there any reason you are doing another Masters when you already have one? A second would be of little additional merit when you could do a lot of CPD or Diploma course(s) for half the budget of a Masters.

Lastly, with your experience, you'd be mad to come to Ireland. You could land likely 3 to 4 times the salary in the US or Canada if you could get a visa sponsor and its the route I'd be taking.

both my undergrad and post grad is a technology related course (IT and IS), after joining and working in IT industry for 5-6 years my interest is slowly shifting to management with technology related roles. That is why i wanted to do MBA, after thorough research i came to know MBA is only worth if i do in top notch B school, it requires lot of effort and preparation. Everything is ok with me except tuitionfee for highly rated B schools, i cannot afford it at this point of time. Hence i started looking for International business and project management related masters.

The reason for choosing Ireland is pretty simple, quality of education is very good and tuition fee when compared to other countries like Canada, US and Australia is 1/3rd. PMI accredited Msc in PM costs 12000EUR in Ireland, same course costs 35000-40000 EUR in Australia and USA. Also i heard IT related job market is thriving in ireland through my mates in UK. So even if i dont get a job in Ireland i can always come back to India and work here with pay rise, so its a Win-Win.

Regarding Visa sponsor , i hope you are aware of what Trump is doing to foreign nationals recently  there is absolutely 0% chance of anyone sponsoring you to US or Canada, it doesnt work that way for foreign nationals. Only way to get job there is to go in student visa and extend ur stay after studies (or) apply for Permanent Residency (Canada).