Program Overview

Digital platforms enable greater connectivity of construction processes to accomplish sustainable projects by simulating, predicting, optimising, managing and monitoring various UN Sustainable Development Goals within the AEC industries especially with the vision towards connecting the real and digital worlds.

Our MSc course is designed to introduce you to the essential areas of digital construction concepts, technologies, BIM and Data Analytics that will help you develop your career and deepening, and widening your understanding of the digital environment that the industry operates nowadays.

This Ulster MSc is a joint course between the Belfast school of Architecture & Built Environment and the school of Computing, Engineering & Intelligent Systems designed to meet the needs of experienced or aspiring professionals who wish to expand their knowledge and skills to equip them for the challenges facing the AEC industry.

By joining this Ulster MSc in Digital Construction you will be joining a group of diverse professionals who come from all over the world to study with us, and as such you will expose yourself to different cultures and develop an international network of professionals.

At Ulster we put a particular emphasis on equipping students with the theoretical and practical knowledge and skills to put into practice the learning from the MSc. You will engage with project environment in order to provide digital solutions for real industry problems. We also invite leading industry people to give guest lectures to MSc students.

Attendance

The course is based on a modular structure with three modules in each semester. Attendance is a mix of class-based, computer-lab, and group work. For full time students, nine hours of staff contact time per week and 36 hours self-directed study per week (all on average).

The modules in Semester 1 will enable you to obtain fundamental knowledge on the subjects of Digital Construction, BIM and Data Analytics. In Semester 2, you will obtain in-depth knowledge on Data Analytics and develop advanced skills in applying your knowledge on Digital Construction in a project-based environment. In Semester 3, you will work on a specific research topic to advance your research skills and explore new areas in the field of Digital Construction.

Over the duration of the course you will develop your knowledge of the technical, theoretical and practical contexts which have led the evolution of a dynamic and innovative digital construction industry.

Start dates

Teaching, Learning and Assessment

We aim to provide a learning and teaching environment where innovation and discovery are central to your education and in which you can take pride that you are an Ulster graduate. Many of the modules are research informed, where you can gain hands-on experience in contemporary research laboratories alongside current research projects. There will be an emphasis on challenge and collaboration, exploring new concepts and real-world construction problems. This will help you to be creative in solution thinking, both individually and cooperatively, so you can develop your own and other’s employable skills.

Teaching is delivered primarily through lectures, computer-labs, group work, and presentations from industry professionals. Project-driven and enquiry-based approaches to learning are central to the course, which includes practical challenges, real-world case studies, team-driven assessments/presentations and industry projects. The use of digital technologies will enrich our learning and teaching environment. Learning and teaching on the course makes use of a suite of Digital Learning tools to create a learning community within Virtual Learning Environment (Blackboard Learn) and Common Data Environments for construction industry. These will support all course modes of delivery (including Distance Learning) and host module areas complete with learning materials of varied media and interactive tools for student engagement, communication and collaboration, online assessment and feedback and content delivery offering you the flexibility to study at your own pace, any place and time.

A range of assessment techniques will be used to enable you to demonstrate your knowledge and understanding of the course concepts and content but also to enable interaction with your peers and the course team. These will include Blogs, chats, on-line forums, Essays and reports, presentations and simulations, and Peer review. The course is assessed in a number of ways to allow us to provide you with valuable feedback on your progress. These mainly include coursework and class tests. All assessments will have clearly identified marking criteria and you will be provided with clear briefs.

The course is designed to cover topics that address key industry challenges within the themes of Digital Construction from the view of addressing global as well as local challenges, thereby ensures students are global citizens. You are expected to apply the obtained Data Science knowledge in the field of Digital Construction; for example, to develop solutions for challenges of: Lean Construction to reduce waste, Generative Design to achieve Net-Zero emission, product innovation, whole life asset performance, evaluating new relevant technologies (e.g. off-site manufacturing), and achieving energy efficient construction. Example of design challenges within Computing modules include: big data processing, data visualisation dashboards and dealing with bias in machine learning applications. Mini-project-based or design-challenge assessment methods are also used throughout the course to also embed a sustainability focus where students develop solutions for low-impact computing and data innovation to ensure the sustainable or viability of business critical systems.

Academic profile

Teaching is informed by academic research at Belfast School of Architecture and Built Environment. The Built Environment (Construction Eng. & Mgmt) programme at Ulster ranked 4th out of 54 programmes in the UK Building League Table in the last two Complete University Guide (2021 & 2022). The Built Environment programme team members at Ulster University have a strong track record in the area of BIM and Digital Construction research, publishing widely in the area since 2013, and supervising Knowledge Transfer Partnerships with industry on Digital Twins. The Computing, Engineering, Intelligent Systems team are active researchers within the Cognitive Analytics Research Lab (CARL). The contribution of Ulster team to Digital Construction and BIM research in Ireland between the period 2016 – 2020 has been acknowledged in a recent publication at CITA BIM Gathering (2021) that conclude “The most prolific academics in publishing in digital construction appear to be Comiskey and McKane in the area of technology, data sharing and education; Motawa in big data and building performance…”. The novel work in this area was recognised by Ulster University who awarded the team a prestigious Distinguised Teaching Fellowship Award in 2016. The team involved in this area have supervised and supported students in various national/international research events, e.g. a student has recently won a prestigious CIAT International Award.

The University employs over 1,000 suitably qualified and experienced academic staff - 59% have PhDs in their subject field and many have professional body recognition.

Courses are taught by staff who are Professors (25%), Readers, Senior Lecturers (20%) or Lecturers (55%).

We require most academic staff to be qualified to teach in higher education: 82% hold either Postgraduate Certificates in Higher Education Practice or higher. Most academic staff (81%) are accredited fellows of the Higher Education Academy (HEA) by Advanced HE - the university sector professional body for teaching and learning. Many academic and technical staff hold other professional body designations related to their subject or scholarly practice.

The profiles of many academic staff can be found on the University’s departmental websites and give a detailed insight into the range of staffing and expertise.  The precise staffing for a course will depend on the department(s) involved and the availability and management of staff.  This is subject to change annually and is confirmed in the timetable issued at the start of the course.

Occasionally, teaching may be supplemented by suitably qualified part-time staff (usually qualified researchers) and specialist guest lecturers. In these cases, all staff are inducted, mostly through our staff development programme ‘First Steps to Teaching’. In some cases, usually for provision in one of our out-centres, Recognised University Teachers are involved, supported by the University in suitable professional development for teaching.

Figures correct for academic year 2021-2022.