Welcome to Canterbury Christ Church University, and congratulations on beginning your MSc in Data Intelligence! We are delighted to welcome you and are confident that you have made an excellent choice in joining us. We look forward to supporting you in achieving your goals and making the most of your time here.

Amina Souag
Course Director

Your Teaching Timetable

Teaching for your course will begin w.c 21 September 2026.

To help you plan your first few weeks, you can view an overview of the teaching activities for your course.

View your first trimester teaching timetable.

On a mobile device, click the arrow next to “Search” at the top right of the page to view your timetable.

If your course is taught in groups, the overview will show activities for all groups. You will only need to attend sessions for your allocated group.

Once teaching begins, your individual timetable and group allocation will be available in MyTimetable provided you have completed online registration and created your computing account.

Your Semester 1 Modules

Visual Analytics and Immersive Technologies

Big Data Databases In Action

Key dates

Academic Calendar: Trimesters [15 Week]

View key dates for this Academic Calendar for 2025-26 including when teaching starts and finishes and when you break for holidays.

Welcome

The first time we will meet will be during the week commencing 14th September 2026, when you will be invited to take part in a programme of Welcome Activities. These are designed to help you settle into university life and ensure you receive the key information needed to get started with your studies.

During this week, you will meet staff and fellow students, as well as familiarise yourself with the campus—perhaps even through a fun treasure hunt! You will also learn more about your course and studying at CCCU, so we encourage you to engage with as many of the activities as possible.

Following the Welcome Activities, you will officially become part of the Data Intelligence community. From Monday 21st September 2026, your academic journey begins as you start your first modules—how exciting!

Starting a postgraduate course can bring a mix of emotions, and this is completely normal. Alongside the excitement of new experiences, you may also have some uncertainties or concerns. Please be reassured that we are here to support you every step of the way. We understand that undertaking a postgraduate degree is a significant commitment of time, energy, and resources, and we are fully dedicated to helping you succeed and achieve your goals. So, embrace the journey ahead—we will be with you all the way.

If you would like to stay up to date with what’s happening at the University, you can follow the Students’ Union on Twitter/X: @christchurchsu. You can also connect with your Course Director over the summer on LinkedIn: Dr Amina Souag, FHEA.

Getting started

​Over the first and second trimesters, you will take Visual Analytics and Immersive Technologies, Big Data Databases in Action, AI for Data Intelligence, as well as your chosen interdisciplinary module. You will also begin your postgraduate computing project, which will continue throughout the third trimester.

​Teaching will be delivered in person on campus, with one- or two-hour lectures followed by practical sessions. Lectures will be recorded and made available for review and recap. Blackboard is the platform used to access course materials.

​There are several learning resources available through our Learning Skills Hub, which you may find particularly useful:

You may find it useful to explore the following resources prior to starting the MSc:

​We recommend you do not buy any particular software as much of the software you will need over your degree will be available to you for free or a much-reduced price once you start.

​You will find having your own computer exceedingly useful. This will help you to do your assessments in your own time and attend any classes that are online. If you are looking to buy a computer then we would suggest that you look at reviews of different computers online as we find it hard to recommend a particular product.

​As a computing student you will find that you will need a computer with an above minimum specification for the chosen operating system (look at what is required for Windows 10). We would suggest that you look at the recommended specification for Visual Studio Professional as an absolute minimum specification.

​Higher specifications will help safeguard you against future increases in minimum requirements, and higher processor speeds will help run multiple programmes at once. For hard disk space higher is required to fit on other software as well, and a minimum suggested size would be 256GB – particularly important if you plan to use solid state drives.

​You should note that we use the Windows environment predominantly for our suite of computing courses, so if you buy an Apple system then it would benefit from being dual boot Windows and MacOS. If you buy a Linux only system then you may find you will need to install a Windows operating system at a later date, and this is generally more expensive than buying a computer with Windows already installed on it.

​Having a web-cam, headphones and possibly even a second monitor are really useful. If you use a laptop, do consider a mouse and full-size keyboard. We have found that students who are trying to study at home appreciate having a good, stable internet connection, and you want to note that changing provider at the moment is taking longer than it has done previously.

Your Must Do Tasks

Once you have been invited to register for your course, there are some key tasks you'll need to complete to make sure you are ready to become a CCCU student. 

Registration invitations are sent towards the end of August. We'll send yours to the email address you used when you applied, so please check this inbox regularly to make sure you don't miss any important information.

Pre-course reading

​​There is no particular reading we want you to do before you arrive, but it may be worth looking at the Technology pages of online news sources to see the common areas that are being talked about in the field of computing and business.

​These are worth looking at once or twice a week if you are not accustomed to reading current affairs articles.

​On the Data Analysis side these talks are very good at explaining why this area is so important - Ted talks - Hans Rosling.

International student success programme

International students: don't miss out! Make sure you register for our international student success programme which provides practical advice on preparing to live and study in the UK.

Contact details

Have a question?

Student Zone is here to help you make the most of your CCCU experience.

Email - studentzone@canterbury.ac.uk

Telephone - 01227 922222 (10am-2pm)