Computing Science Major

The Computing Science Major is a challenging and intense program designed for students of all experience levels—no previous programming experience is necessary. All you need is an interest in technology and a drive to succeed!

During the first two years, you will gain the necessary tools of the trade: programming, design, analysis, and mathematical skills. But there is more to Computing Science than just programming; once in third year, students can focus in one or more of the following broad areas:

Artificial Intelligence

Artificial Intelligence is the study of the design of intelligent agents. The main goals are to understand the principles underlying intelligent behaviour and to realize these principles in the design of intelligent artifacts. Some sample areas where AI is used include: speech and text recognition, robotics, data mining, and email spam filtering.

Computer Graphics and Multimedia

Computer Graphics is concerned with the creation and manipulation of digitized visual content. Topics include graphical interfaces, modeling, rendering, animation, visualization, and multimedia design. Applications are varied and include movies, gaming, education, medical imaging, product and website design, training simulators, and many more.

Programming Languages and Software

All software whether it is found in a computer, an elevator, a cell phone, or your car is written using a programming language whose aim is to predictably and reliably control the behavior of a machine or device to produce desired outcomes. This area will teach you in depth the central concepts you’ll need to learn new languages as they arise.

Information systems

This area will teach you about software engineering and data base systems design concepts, and provide the academic preparation necessary for the efficient and effective development of large software products and the design and management of computer information systems.

Computing Systems

Computing systems are at the foundation of every computing environment and cover some of the following areas: operating systems, data communication, computer architecture, compiler design and distributed networks. As such, knowledge of computing systems is important across a wide range of applications and industries.

Theoretical Computing

This area focuses on mathematical tools and techniques for the formal analysis of computer algorithms (a list of instructions for completing a task which is communicated to a machine using a programming language). This area will provide you with the tools for finding out if problems can be solved, for classifying the difficulty of solvable problems, and for demonstrating the correctness of solutions.

See a list of courses for each of the concentration areas.

In addition, our students can take advantage of our co-operative education program which allows students to gain valuable, career-related, paid work experience. Over 85% of our co-op students find work with one of their previous co-op employers after graduation.

With access to a wide variety of potential employers, ranging from video game development studios to cancer research labs to multi-national telecommunications companies, our computing science graduates are well prepared for life-long learning in this dynamic and evolving discipline.

View detailed requirements here.