THE UNIVERSITY of Cyprus’ Polytechnic School will start running undergraduate and postgraduate courses at the beginning of the next academic year in September, the administration said yesterday.
The Polytechnic School will be made up of four departments: Electrical and Computer Engineering, Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, Civil and Environmental Engineering and Architecture. The latter will not be offered until September 2004.
All courses will be available at undergraduate, masters and PhD level, said Professor Andreas Alexandrou. However, the master’s programme will not be implemented until the following year.
Undergraduate courses are four-year programmes and are free of tuition fees. Masters programmes usually cost around £3,000 a year and PhD programmes around £2,000.
“However, there may be slight differences in price depending on whether or not students opt to take on more lessons,” said a university official. Students will require a minimum of 30 units to complete any given master’s course, but some took on more, she said.
The school plans to cover an in-depth technical curriculum by combining knowledge with international research through high-quality teaching. In turn it hoped to promote and strengthen competition and enterprise in Cyprus, officials said.
“As we head towards Europe and a society and economy based more and more on know-how and innovation, Cyprus, with its strategic advantages is expected to find itself at the centre of technological and scientific developments. The Polytechnic School’s primary aim is to prepare its students to take on leadership roles in an economy based on services, research and technology.”
Students will be called on to question, research, plan and design their choice subject, in collaboration with leading professors from Europe and north America, fellow students, and industrial and research organisations.
“Some will have the opportunity to travel to other EU countries as part of a student exchange programme,” said Alexandrou.
Each programme will be based on international academic prototypes, and tailored to meet local industrial requirements.
This school was independent of any other technical institute on the island, Alexandrou added. “It has nothing to do with the Higher Technical Institute that is primarily run by the Labour Ministry and is independent of the new Technical University being built.”
For undergraduate entry, students have to sit exams in modern Greek, mathematics, physics and either chemistry, biology or technology. Architecture students will also have to pass exams in art and graphic communication. “Masters students and PhD students have to apply to the department directly, after determining there is a place, but will not have to sit any examinations,” said Alexandrou.
The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.
