## A fuller review of my Master of Science in Statistics programme in NUS

### 2020/05/10

Sparrows taking shelter from the afternoon shower at the Faculty of Science (December 2018)

Back in January 2017, I first seriously considered taking up a postgraduate degree, as a means to improve myself and continue learning. Well, it wasn’t a long and hard decision, really, as I had and still have the freedom, the capacity and the means to study more.

Taking a part-time Masters this year in 2017

2017/01/30

I am leaning towards taking a part-time Masters this year in 2017. Points of considerations:

• Masters or PhD?
• Full-time or part-time?
• (If masters) technical or non-technical?
• (If full-time) Overseas or local?
• (If local) NUS or NTU?

Full-time is personally a non-option for me, as I don’t see the financial sense in taking a sabbatical to pursue a full-time programme. That leaves full-time and overseas out.

Based on what I know about a PhD programme, part-time PhD sounds like a nightmare. That leaves part-time Masters in Singapore as my option.

Next question: technical or non-technical? Well I am leaning towards to doing something with technical content when studying - non-technical content can be picked up most of the time simply by being widely read and learning from work experiences. This means statistics or computing for me.

And NUS is probably the better choice than NTU. SMU is not in my consideration.

So for now, my choice is going to be M.Sc. Statistics from NUS.

Quoting myself in January 2017, here. Was I rigourous in my decision-making? Hmm…

So I decided to go with a Master of Science in Statistics programme in NUS, and starting my first semester in August 2017. I then took 5 semesters, all the way to December 2019, to complete the programme. Today, I have since happily graduated and have had a good experience with the programme.

Around midway through the programme, I wrote a short review on the logistics and my experience of the programme so far.

My Master of Science in Statistics programme in NUS

2019/02/09

I have gotten quite a couple of questions regarding my current MSc Statistics programme in NUS. Here are some broadstroke information about the programme and how I am approaching it.

• I’m doing the MSc by Coursework programme, which means a research thesis is not part of my curriculum. A MSc by Research option is available.

• Under the Coursework programme, there is a Track 1 (40MC) programme and a Track 2 (80MC) one. Basically dependent on whether you have a Honours in your Bachelor’s degree. I’m doing the Track 1 programme - 40MC is equivalent to 10 modules. Under usual circumstances, it takes 2 full-time semesters to finish 10 modules, i.e. 1 academic year. Semesters run as per typical undergraduate semesters in Singapore.

• There’s also the part-time option, where one would take 4 to 5 semesters to finish the 10 modules - 5 semesters is basically 2 modules x 5 semesters = 10 modules.

• I’m on the part-time programme. Personally, 3 modules on a part-time basis per semester is too much for me to handle - so I opt to finish my MSc in 5 semesters, or 2.5 academic years.

• I’m currently in my 4th semester, so would be finishing the programme requirements by Dec 2019 and graduate during July 2020 (commencement).

• For MSc Statistics, lectures typically run from 7pm to 10pm weeknights. Each module has 1 lecture per week, with the typical workload of tutorials, homework assignments, individual or group projects, subjected to respective lecturer’s discretion.

### How I went about my life while being a part-time student

My time as a part-time student (2.5 years in total6) basically flew by, simply because of the packed schedules and constant back and forth between work and school. Since most lectures happened between 7pm to 10pm on weeknights, on lecture nights I would (gladly) leave work on time or early and make my way to school for dinner and lecture. I tried very much to not skip any lectures regardless of lecture recordings, but this proved to be occasionally impossible. And there were nights where I was simply too exhausted to go to school and sit for 3 hours to absorb content. While most of the time I would take MRT/bus to school, sometimes I would splurge a little and take a Grab. It was always good to reach school earlier, so that I can take my time with my dinner and enjoy the cheap Science canteen food and a cup of coffee.

On most non-lecture nights I typically don’t touch any of my schoolwork - but I would dedicate one day of my weekend (usually the Sunday) to catch up on lectures and work on tutorials and assignments. During these days, I would spend the day in Utown and sort of “blend in” with the other undergraduates. If it’s not at Utown, then I would either spend the day in the Medical library or the Science library. Either way, there is still plenty of cheap food and coffee in school to replenish myself throughout my mugging.

Utown (July 2017)

Of course, sometimes one day simply isn’t enough so it would spill over to the other weeknights from time to time. Even as a part-time student, Recess Week was always great as it means no need to travel to school, no new content, and more time to catch up, and of course prepare for the mid-term exam or assignment.

Final exam schedule (May 2018)

When it comes to the final exams, my protocol has always been to take roughly about 1.5 weeks of paid or study leave to prepare for the 2 final exams I have per semester. This was always a good break from work7, as I typically don’t spend that much time away from work8. I might also take one extra day of leave after the last paper to just relax and “celebrate” the fact that I finished yet another semester, before going back to work.

In all, it was a rewarding experience and I am very glad that I took the plunge to commit to the MSc for the 5 semesters. It was great being a student again, having blocks of time during weeknights and weekends focusing on nothing else but the content on my lecture notes and assignments. I guess for those of you who have been in the workforce for a while now and would like a change of pace or a break in stagnancy, going back to school is definitely an option, be it full-time or part-time. In any case, I hope this post was as fun for you to read as it was for me to write. Thanks for reading!

1. I believe the content in this module became more applied and less theoretical after the renaming. I took it before the renaming.
2. Though later on I realise that in the MSc programme, fulfilling pre-requisites is understandably loosely followed. It’s OK to take 5201 beyond your first semester.
3. What I did was that I would spend the whole Saturday morning to rest and get ready and then have lunch in school. After the lecture, I would then head over to VivoCity for dinner, coffee, and then do a bit more of work or studying. It was rather therapeutic.
4. Other than copulae. I had a tough time understanding and appreciating the concept of a copula, and happened to find this blog post do an expert job at demystifying it.
5. Don’t ask me why this Edusave -> PSEA -> CPF-OA transferring exists.
6. Throughout the 2.5 years, I had in fact switched jobs twice (another story for another time). Guess this didn’t really affect anything for my studying, other than going to school from different workplaces, and figuring out different printer settings in 3 offices to print my lecture notes.
7. Studying to prepare for final exams is fun, but writing those “cheatsheets” definitely is not. They were a bane. If you don’t know what “cheatsheets” are, good for you.
8. Yes, I am a little bit of a workaholic. Just a bit.