The popular quotation from 16th century English philosopher Francis Bacon unmistakably pronounced "Knowledge is power." We currently live in an era of knowledge explosion. Knowledge is distinctively power, yet knowledge about knowledge is even more powerful. This is all contributed by the revolution as well as evolution of modern computers which enable us to preserve, accumulate, organise, and maintain knowledge. In the Master of Science in Computer Science Program, we can teach you not only knowledge about computers and their applications, but also how computers facilitate knowledge discovery and knowledge management in our daily lives.

The Computer Science discipline is the core of modern Information Technology (IT). Many people have the wrong perception that IT industry recesses world-wide and IT job market does not have a good outlook in Hong Kong. The fact is, IT world-wide growth is tremendous and many industries require advancement in IT to maintain their leading edges. This is particularly the case for Hong Kong, which strongly require quality IT people like you in banking, finance, commerce, trading, service, and supply-chain management industries. Not only do world class companies in these industries take bases in Hong Kong, but they also highly regard IT talents to meet their business challenges and to keep their competitive advantages. Our Master of Science in Computer Science Programme is designed to satisfy this urgent industry need, and you will find it beneficial to attend this programme.

In order to educate modern IT talents for Hong Kong industries, our overall programme emphasizes three major training focuses for IT: Integration Technology, Intelligence Technology, and Interactive Technology. Seeing IT as an integration technology, we designed courses in service oriented computing and service integration technologies. Seeing IT as an intelligence technology, we provided courses in autonomous agent systems, machine intelligence, and knowledge learning and discovery. Seeing IT as an interactive technology, we offered courses in interactive computer networking games, multimedia technologies, and computer vision and pattern recognition. In pursuing the Master of Science degree in this programme, you will not only know what IT services can be specified and provided, but also understand how IT systems are developed and evaluated. If you are IT professionals, you will sharpen your technical skills and know-hows for your daily work. If you are working in IT-related industries, you will gain deeper understanding of a broad range of IT disciplines, and extend your circle of influence with the power of knowledge.

Since its establishment in 1996, our programme has experienced a successful first decade. Upon entering the second decade, our new programme in 2007 highlights four aspects of the curriculum design: flexibility, practicality, intensity, and diversity. To allow maximal flexibility for students, all eight courses for getting the Master of Science degree would change to all elective courses. The courses that will be offered each year are determined by surveying students’ preferences in advance. To strive for practicality of the programme, there are Individual Projects offered by various faculty members, which will be conducted based on mutual interests between lecturers and students. Also all classroom lectures attempt to provide practical industrial experience when deemed necessary. To achieve intensity of the curriculum, the programme is designed for two-year duration with wide a scope and solid contents in modern computer science and IT disciplines. To encourage diversity of the programme, about 20 courses are available for choices. These courses spam through various science and technology areas, and they are offered by more than 30 faculty members within the Computer Science & Engineering Department of The Chinese University of Hong Kong.

In summary, I strongly believe that our master programme will meet your needs for a success career path. I sincerely welcome you to join our programme!