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Engagement
  • Author Author: dubbie
  • Date Created: 10 Dec 2018 1:21 PM Date Created
  • Views 998 views
  • Likes 10 likes
  • Comments 6 comments
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Studying

dubbie
dubbie
10 Dec 2018

One of the goals of my retirement was to undertake some further study, mostly in robotics and Artificial Intelligence. Not for any constructive reason but just for fun. I didn't want to do anything too heavy or demanding as I wanted to be retired and just have fun so a full undergraduate degree was out of the question. I thought of doing some post-graduate study which seemed to be at about the right level for what I wanted, but I didn't fancy a complete Masters or similar. I also wanted to be able to walk to the University campus as my desire was to include the exercise into the process as another fun activity. I didn't mind paying some money but I didn't want to hand over a great load of my hard-earned retirement cash. Obviously this meant I would have to go to my local University, which just happens to be the University of Surrey in the UK. It is not too far away to walk to and they have an attractive campus University so that seemed ideal.

 

I looked at the post-graduate modules that they offered and there was one that seemed about right, Neural Networks and AI Programming. It wasn't exactly want I wanted but it seemed close enough. It was a bit pricy at £1100 for the module which is about the cost of a nice holiday in the sun, but I thought, why not. Additionally the module ran in the spring semester so I would still have the summer for working in the garden, being on holiday and generally lazing about in the sunshine. Unfortunately the University does not allow individual modules to be taken - I have no idea why not - it has to be a whole Programme. They do offer post-graduate certificates and diplomas so I thought I might be able to do my study as part of a part-time post-graduate certificate, with a January entry. Seems that these awards are only fall back awards if you do not successfully on the full Masters. Plus, they do not allow January intakes either, so basically I was stuck. I would have had to take a part-time masters starting in September, which would have meant studying two Modules before I got to the one I wanted. That all seemed too much trouble, too much effort, but mostly too much money.

 

I looked around for alternatives and at the moment I am working my way through the Essentials units on this Element14 website. These are OK but they are relatively simple, they are not about Artificial Intelligence much and they do not involve any walking to the campus. However, they have the major advantage of being free! As I wanted to do more I thought I would look into MOOCs. These are Massive Open access On-line Courses. There might be something that would take my fancy sufficiently. I am not a particular fan of computer based learning as it is difficult to achieve a good challenging level of intellectual stimulation. I did look for some AI MOOCs, and they do exist, however I was first attracted to some robot MOOCs. At the moment I am doing a Mobile Robotics MOOC from Open2Study, which is from an Australian University. This is a four week course running from November until December, with one module per week. I have done two modules so far. This is OK but it is fairly simplistic, it doesn't contain any mathematics and there is no practical activity - at the moment. There are tests but they are relatively trivial, not even as challenging as the Essential Quizs. It does seem to be providing a good overview of the entire field of robotics and I have learnt some things I didn't know, which has been good. It completes this week, so I am a bit behind and will have to put in a bit more effort to make sure I finish properly.

 

I have also signed up for a Robotics MOOC being provided by the University of Reading via Future Learn. This MOOC starts on 7th Jan'19 so if you are interested yourself you could look it up. The link to join is:  https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/begin-robotics/8.

 

This MOOC is also free but seems to have a practical element, using a simulator (provided as part of the MOOC) and possibly real components (which you have to provide yourself). If you want a certificate then you have to pay for that. My intention is that for future blogs I will report back on how the MOOC is going.

This is not quite what I wanted as it is not AI and does not involve a walk to the campus, but it is further study so I will count it as meeting one of the three of my objectives. If it turns out OK I might consider  a more significant MOOC.

Dubbie

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Top Comments

  • fmilburn
    fmilburn over 6 years ago +4
    Hi Dubbie, The robotics course you linked to looks interesting. I have taken internet courses from both edx and udemy and have found them to be of variable quality. But, the cost is very reasonable and…
  • three-phase
    three-phase over 6 years ago +3
    An article on Forbes you may find interesting if you haven't already seen it. All online learning though, which may not suit your needs. Forbes AI Courses Kind regards.
  • dubbie
    dubbie over 6 years ago in reply to three-phase +2
    Donald Thanks for this. The list looks interesting, although the Forbes web site is irritating with pops up popping up all the time and I couldn't get the video to stop playing. I'm going to have a more…
  • MarinaMiller
    MarinaMiller over 3 years ago

    Great article, thanks for sharing. I am just writing a research paper on artificial intelligence. And I dream to get my master's degree. I hope I will be able to do it. My brother is also getting ready to enroll right now. And I'm helping him with his statement of purpose. Although I think it is better to ask for help from sop service and get a qualified statement. I think to advise my brother, because it is very important that this document is written convincingly and can compete.

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  • three-phase
    three-phase over 6 years ago in reply to dubbie

    You are welcome, hope you find something useful from it. Yes, the Forbes site is a hive of advertising, personally, I try and spend as little time as possible on there.

     

    Kind regards.

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  • dubbie
    dubbie over 6 years ago in reply to three-phase

    Donald

     

    Thanks for this. The list looks interesting, although the Forbes web site is irritating with pops up popping up all the time and I couldn't get the video to stop playing. I'm going to have a more detailed look at this list and see if there is anything I might have a go at.

     

    Dubbie

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  • dubbie
    dubbie over 6 years ago in reply to fmilburn

    The Forbes list of AI modules by Donald Lane looks interesting so I am going to check them out.

     

    Sometimes I wish I lived by the sea.

     

    Dubbie

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  • three-phase
    three-phase over 6 years ago

    An article on Forbes you may find interesting if you haven't already seen it. All online learning though, which may not suit your needs.

     

    Forbes AI Courses

     

    Kind regards.

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