Manchester or York?

[Tutterly]

Does anyone have a child at either of these two universities? My DD can't decide which to firm for software engineering.

Bump

York may be very nice but I cannot see it having the breadth and depth of Manchester. Long before the London stars rose, Manchester (and Glasgow) have been head and shoulders above most other unis, including good ones like Edinburgh, Bristol, Durham for a wide spectrum university offering (and subsequently, employment prospects), if Oxford or Cambridge were not suitable. There are other gems that can hold their own in some subjects, but they tend to be more specialised. You can't really go wrong with Manchester (or Glasgow) if you prefer a more northerly uni. Unless someone comes along to point out that York is to software engineering as say Warwick is to maths, I would go for Manchester.

Thanks Maryso.

I was in your DD's position (albeit a few years ago now) and I ended up picking Manchester. For me, Manchester had so much more history in the field and its research interests looked more interesting (so the later year modules on offer as modules looked more appealing to me than York's). If there's a particular field within computer science/ Software she's interested in it would be worth checking out how the 2 compare for later year options.

Not sure about software engineering but Manchester's Computer Science course looked FANTASTIC. Very focused on being up to date and relevant for future careers. Sadly DD wasn't interested (not clear what she is really interested in though!).

I would look at which has better industry links. Where are the jobs? Manchester might win on that front. They are clearly different universities in terms of city size and location of university so I would consider that too.

Manchester would be streets ahead of York in computer science and software engineering. It is also much easier for a university in Manchester to establish closer industry links as the software sector in the Greater Manchester region is considerably larger.