Vorheriger Bericht
Adjusted to the pandemic
Some Potential, but major flaws
I wouldn't recommend this study programme to everyone. If you are already knowledgable in HCI/UX, think about doing a Master that specializes in a relevant field. This degree is very broad and covers everything a little bit. Which might be good for people who transition from a different field and are completely new to HCI. As someone who does have some (but honestly not that much) experience in HCI/UX, I don't feel like I learned a whole lot here and I definitely don't feel like a "Master" in anything.
The first semester has a lot of good theoretical and practical input on relevant topics and skills in this field. The second and third semester are pretty much only project work, and most of it in groups. There are 3 major issues I have with this programme:
1. Too many group projects
At times, I had 5(!) group projects silmutaneously, all with different people. Imagine the chaos in organizing regular meetings.
In a group project, you will mostly just do the tasks you already know how to do anyways from your bachelor. There is no space or time to learn a new skill, to try out new methods. You also don't want to disappoint your group and do a task someone else might do better. Just stick to what you know and is the least effort, because otherwise you will not make it through the semester. All group projects are also pretty much the same. Start completely from scratch, come up with a topic, do some basic user research, make a first rudimentary prototype. That's it. No time for evaluation, iterating, doing some advanced research.
2. Organization:
Honestly, a catastrophe. You work in 2 university systems, 2 email adresses, 2 time tables, etc. Your schedule will look completely different every single week, there is no consistency. It will also randomly and spontaneously change. You can't plan your life more than a week in advance in this programme. In the 1. Semester, you have 10-12 different courses. Many of them with regular hand-ins. Just figuring out when to be where, when to hand in what in which system is so exhausting. There was also one case where a lecturer was straight up disrespectful towards students, changing plans that were not communicated anywhere and then just expecting us to adapt spontaneously, even if we have good reasons why it is not possible. We get blamed, no apology given ever.
3. Workload:
The workload in this programme, especially in the third semester, is immense. A lot of it is useless organizational tasks as a reslut of 1. and 2. We have to work on weekends and during the semester break we hand in our documentation and reflection papers which we have to do in many modules. The worst part is that I don't feel like these issues are really taken seriously. This is not a completely new programme, and these issues are reported from students since the first cohort.
Not all is bad of course, there were really good lectures that taught me a lot as well. For example, this programme has a strong focus on physical prototyping with Arduino, which was new to me. Project based work also means you build up a portfolio while you are getting your degree, which is neat. Last but not least, Salzburg is absolutely beautiful. Still, if I could I would not choose this programme again and look for something else.
The first semester has a lot of good theoretical and practical input on relevant topics and skills in this field. The second and third semester are pretty much only project work, and most of it in groups. There are 3 major issues I have with this programme:
1. Too many group projects
At times, I had 5(!) group projects silmutaneously, all with different people. Imagine the chaos in organizing regular meetings.
In a group project, you will mostly just do the tasks you already know how to do anyways from your bachelor. There is no space or time to learn a new skill, to try out new methods. You also don't want to disappoint your group and do a task someone else might do better. Just stick to what you know and is the least effort, because otherwise you will not make it through the semester. All group projects are also pretty much the same. Start completely from scratch, come up with a topic, do some basic user research, make a first rudimentary prototype. That's it. No time for evaluation, iterating, doing some advanced research.
2. Organization:
Honestly, a catastrophe. You work in 2 university systems, 2 email adresses, 2 time tables, etc. Your schedule will look completely different every single week, there is no consistency. It will also randomly and spontaneously change. You can't plan your life more than a week in advance in this programme. In the 1. Semester, you have 10-12 different courses. Many of them with regular hand-ins. Just figuring out when to be where, when to hand in what in which system is so exhausting. There was also one case where a lecturer was straight up disrespectful towards students, changing plans that were not communicated anywhere and then just expecting us to adapt spontaneously, even if we have good reasons why it is not possible. We get blamed, no apology given ever.
3. Workload:
The workload in this programme, especially in the third semester, is immense. A lot of it is useless organizational tasks as a reslut of 1. and 2. We have to work on weekends and during the semester break we hand in our documentation and reflection papers which we have to do in many modules. The worst part is that I don't feel like these issues are really taken seriously. This is not a completely new programme, and these issues are reported from students since the first cohort.
Not all is bad of course, there were really good lectures that taught me a lot as well. For example, this programme has a strong focus on physical prototyping with Arduino, which was new to me. Project based work also means you build up a portfolio while you are getting your degree, which is neat. Last but not least, Salzburg is absolutely beautiful. Still, if I could I would not choose this programme again and look for something else.