Recruiting Imperial College Software Engineering Students and Graduates

Transcription

1 Department of Computing Recruiting Imperial College Software Engineering Students and Graduates The Department of Computing in Imperial College London promotes relevant work placements and graduate positions to both undergraduate and postgraduate students. Employers can advertise a wide range of career opportunities through our office, including six month industrial placements, summer internships and short term work experience, graduate positions, opportunities for professional software engineers studying for an MSc or PhD in our department, including our alumni. Companies can also offer student Prizes and sponsorship, thus raising their visibility with potential employees for the future, while helping out some of our top candidates become the Software Engineers of the future. We can also assist with Career Talks organised in our department where companies have the opportunity to meet our students. The teaching in the Department of Computing in Imperial College London has been rated first in The Guardian 2006 University Guide and third in The Times Good University Guide We welcome collaborations from large-scale enterprises as well as SMEs or start-up companies.

2 Graduate Recruitment The department careers office promotes degree related opportunities to undergraduates and postgraduates students, including graduate positions and contractual work. To advertise graduate positions, please contact the Careers Office on the details below or visit our web site The main drive for graduate recruitment usually takes place during the autumn and spring terms. Employers have the opportunity to visit our department and meet with final year students interested in applying. Please contact us for further details on how to arrange a time and book a suitable venue. If you would like to target a broader range of students across the college, please get in touch with the central careers service Graduate profile Steve: Software Engineering The Department of Computing is one of the best in Europe and therefore I felt that is would be an excellent choice to read Software Engineering at Imperial. I wasn t wrong. It prepared me to perform very well during the six months of my third year industrial placement. I found the experience of putting the academic side of the course into practice invaluable. I was placed at Morgan Stanley and have secured a job from them when I graduate.

3 Summer internships Our students often undertake work for a company during their summer vacation, usually at the end of their second year. Usually students undertaking a four year MEng degree may choose to continue working with a company during their industrial placement as well. Similarly, students on a three year degree are interested in these opportunities as one of the best ways to secure a graduate position in the following year. Relevant vacancies can be advertised through the departmental careers service, who can also offer advice on suitable strategies for this type of recruitment. Please note that we do not offer one year industrial placements, i.e. sandwich courses.

4 6-Month Industrial Placements Recruiting students on short-term projects such as for example on a six-month industrial placement appears to be on of the most effective ways of attracting world-class candidates upon graduation. The Masters in Engineering Computing Course The MEng course is a four year undergraduate programme with a six months compulsory industrial placement in the summer term of the third academic year, from the beginning of April to the end of September. Only students on a 2:1 level after the first two years of study are accepted onto the MEng course, and subsequently allowed to do a six months placement. By the start of the industrial placement, the students would have completed three full academic years of instruction in computer science and software engineering principles, and would have learnt and used a wide variety of programming languages and software tools. As part of their course, students can specialise in a number of areas such as Computing, Software Engineering, Mathematical Foundations, Computational Management, Artificial Intelligence. Another option is for students to choose the European Programme. For further details, please see our teaching pages under Projects The student will be a member of a team of software professionals, and will be involved with one or two larger software engineering projects throughout their training period rather than being used as a programmer on a large number of smaller tasks. Typical projects have included: fixed income derivatives work at Morgan Stanley, involving extracting data from a database using Java and generating convenient access keys in SQL under the XP environment involving ASP and XML; producing graphics for special effects at The Foundry, a small company selling special effects tools to the film and TV industry performance evaluation at CERN of the GRIDFTP protocol across an inter-continental 2.5GBps link. +++industrial placements+++ A cost effective way of getting a project done at the highest technical standards An effective way of recruiting graduates that have worked as part of your team for these six months, and thus reducing recruitment costs A way to exchange new ideas combined with fresh enthusiasm and knowledge of some of the latest technology Remember, you can contribute to the training and development of a new generation of software engineers Placement student profile Mu: MEng Software Engineering I was in a development role in the Java Technology Centre at IBM, assigned to create a proof of concept that merged my team's templating technology with an emerging Lotus product. This has meant that my time spent here at IBM has rarely been dull, because I have had to use and develop in a number of different environments and languages. The support from colleagues and managers has been excellent, they were always proactive in making sure I am comfortable and enjoying the placement. I was also impressed that they assigned to me work that was interesting and that carried a degree of responsibility, because they expected a deliverable from me at the end of the placement. They have also asked me to present my project at the IBM research lab in Beijing.

5 Recruitment Timetable The best time to advertise industrial placement opportunities with your organisation is at the beginning of the academic term in late September through to March the following year. However, in order to have access to a wider range of candidates, you are advised to do that as early as possible, preferably having the job or project specification available the first week in October. August March - Contact us - Prepare a job or project description - Fill in a Placement provider form (supplied by DoC) August March - Receive students applications - Assess students preselected for interview/ assessment centre - Make offer(s) 1 April - end September - Students on placement - Receive a visit from an academic tutor to ensure the placement is going well 1 st week in October - Students present their industrial experience to which managers and employers are invited - Students also submit a logbook on their placement, which is approved by the company - Placement opportunities will be advertised online

6 During the placement The industrial placement students are usually paid for their work, although the college does not stipulate a rate of pay. Other statutory terms and conditions will also apply, including holiday leave allowance. These conditions will be part of the contract of employment or appointment letter agreed between the company and their employee, i.e. the student. The department will keep in close contact with the company, students, managers and mentors during the placement. In the period June/July the tutee and/or the placements coordinator will visit the company in order to assess his/her achievements, plus the company's assessment of the student and the quality of the placement. The tutor then submits a report about their visit. Logbooks Placement students are required to produce a written account of their work in the form of an engineering logbook, describing their training and technical work. Presentations After the termination of the placement, during the autumn term of the fourth year, the students are required to give a ten minutes oral presentation. Company assessment Assessment of the student's contributions and achievements by a company supervisor during the placement is also desirable. The student's personal tutor usually has an informal meeting with his/her manager and/or mentor which usually takes place within the first couple of months. Confidentiality concerns presentation and/or the logbook before the placement begins. The company can ask the student to get his/her presentation approved by an internal manager in charge of the project or the IP department. This practice would enable the company to remove any commercially sensitive material and give the student a fair chance of assessment. This should not however prevent the student from discussing your organisation, the technologies they used or what they have learned from their work experience. Please remember that these presentations also promote your company. Non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) We recognise that some of these projects may contain confidential information. As such, NDAs are usually in place between a company and the. Please note that these cannot be signed between an individual academic assessors and the company. Work Permits Overseas students do not require a work permit for an industrial placement, which is a compulsory part of their studies. Our partners Companies taking industrial placement students include IBM, Philips, Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, UBS Investment Bank, Barclays Capital, Citigroup, Amadeus, JP Morgan, Mintel, Propero, Formicary, Teamphone, The Foundry, Fujitsu California, Nucoda, MIK, eshopsworks, Vodafone, Lehman Brothers, Kinitron, CERN, and others. A high proportion of students are offered jobs in the companies when they graduate, which indicates the success of the scheme. For more details and regular updates, please visit our web pages In order to assess our students we recommend that the company should resolve any confidentiality concerns regarding the

7 Marketing your company to our students If you would like to make your company profile known and have access to some of our best students at the same time, you could offer prizes, bursaries or sponsorship, depending on your area of interest. If you d like to meet our students, the Department can also help you organise Careers Talks. Prizes Companies are invited to sponsor prizes for outstanding student achievements such as academic excellence in examinations, or exemplary individual or group project work. These prizes are displayed on our web site and are announced at Imperial s annual Commemoration Day ceremonies. They offer a straightforward way for companies to associate themselves with and obtain exposure to our best students. Minimum prize sponsorship is 1000 per year for a minimum of five years, with prizes taking the form of cheques, book tokens or medals. Companies that already offer prizes include Morgan Stanley, Phillips, Formicary Software, BT and IBM. Meeting our students You may also choose to introduce your company to our students and talk about the range of career opportunities available to them. We can help you secure an appropriate venue and refreshments through our Events office. Please contact us for further details as exact charges and procedures may change in each academic year.

8 Contact If you would like to advertise work opportunities or you would simply like to find out more about student recruitment, please contact the industrial liaison office Helen Harth Industrial Placements, Careers, Prizes & Industrial Sponsorship Tel: +44 (0) Fax: +44 (0) Queen's Gate, South Kensington Campus, Imperial College London London SW7 2AZ, UK