As part of their taught programme, students are required to complete individual projects, which constitute a substantial piece of independent work involving the technical and research skills developed during the taught part of the degree.
Students can select from several topics proposed by University members, external organisations, or define their own. Projects address a variety of domains related to data science, including:
Statistics, System, Process Modelling, Provenance, Visualisation, Machine Learning, Image Informatics, Computer Vision, Natural Language Processing, Generative AI, Explainable AI
Projects start after the Easter break (end of April) and last for 4 months, finishing during the summer. At the end of the project, students provide a dissertation in the form of a scientific research paper and a poster to disseminate their work. Posters are displayed during a Poster Event in mid-August, open to anyone with an interest in Data Science.
Industrial Placement
Project topics can be proposed by external organisations. Students are supervised jointly with a designated person from the external organisation, along with an academic supervisor from the school. The industry supervisor is responsible for monitoring regular progress, technology implementation, and other relevant aspects, while the academic supervisor ensures the fulfilment of degree requirements.
Benefit to Industry
Industrial dissertations offer an opportunity for the industry where students work on problems defined by the industry itself. Industries can propose topics they wish to explore or solve within a limited time frame. This collaboration provides a chance to co-develop skills with the students and their academic supervisors, tapping into sought-after talents early in the process, and evaluating them over an extended period. It also helps build brand recognition and increases industry visibility among students.
Timeline
Industry Engagement
Industries are expected to provide an environment that allows learners to have a valuable and enriching experience while meeting the requirements of their degree. This includes an appropriate induction and initial training, where learners are introduced to the company culture and paired with a mentor who provides guidance and feedback throughout their placement. Learners should have access to essential tools, resources, and additional training opportunities to help them perform their tasks effectively. Furthermore, learners should be given sufficient time and space to complete the various deliverables of their project.
Industries are also expected to support learners throughout their placement, either through a monthly stipend or, at the very least, in-kind support to cover relevant expenses, such as travel to company locations.
Intellectual Property
Newcastle University students own the intellectual property that they generate, whether or not it arises in connection with their studies.
If an external organisation wishes to possess the IP of the work, this needs to be drawn up between the student and the organisation. This can be done using an Assignment of Intellectual Property to transfer ownership of intellectual property rights from one party to another.
Newcastle University cannot advise individual students on how to handle their own IP as this could result in a conflict of interest for the university.
The UK Intellectual Property Office offers resources for background information and training materials on intellectual property.
Propose a project
To propose a Data Science project, please complete the project form at the following link: Submit an industry project.
For further questions, please contact computing.datascience@newcastle.ac.uk.