Programme: MCom specialising in Advanced Data Analytics (Coursework)

Kindly take note of the disclaimer regarding qualifications and degree names.
Code Faculty Department
07250069 Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences Department: Economic and Management Sciences Dean's Office
Credits Duration NQF level
Minimum duration of study: 1 year Total credits: 180 NQF level:  09

Admission requirements

General Admission Regulations:

Refer to the UP Institutional Admissions Policy as well as the General Academic Regulations and Student Rules (Go to www.up.ac.za./yearbooks/home and click on General Rules and Regulations, then on General Academic Regulations and Student Rules)

  1.  All applications must be accompanied by the following documents: 
    1. Certified full academic transcripts from undergraduate to current level; 
    2. Certified copy of ID or passport; 
    3. A research concept note (not applicable to honours or coursework master's degrees): A description of the proposed research field indicating a research topic and the broad scope of the proposed study, not exceeding 500 words.
  2.  All applicants with international qualifications must submit the following documents, subject to provision number 9: 
    1. A SAQA evaluation of the completed qualification or a comprehensive Foreign Qualification Report
    2. *TOEFL or IELTS or Pearson Test of English or Oxford Test of English test results (if applicable) 
    3. Certified copy of passport.
  3. All postgraduate applications are subject to departmental admissions processes. 
  4. Admissions is based on the content of and performance in the prior degree, bridging arrangements (where required), academic merit and prior work experience (if applicable). 
  5. Admission to all qualifications is subject to supervisory capacity and/or research projects in the field of specialisation in a department, therefore the relevant department has the right to limit the number of students per year. 
  6. Complying with the minimum admissions requirements, does not automatically guarantee admission to the degree. 
  7. Proposed research studies for masters and doctoral applicants should align with the research focus of the relevant department. 
  8. If a qualifying candidate has expressed an interest in a field of study that the relevant department cannot  accommodate, the applicant may be considered for an alternative project. 
  9. All postgraduate applicants must be proficient in English as English is the official language of tuition, communication and correspondence at the University of Pretoria. Candidates who cannot provide evidence that previous studies were completed in English, must submit TOEFL or IELTS or Pearson Test of English or Oxford Test of English test results with their application. 
  10. All applicants must be computer literate.
  11. All students need to have access to an internet enabled device, as well as consistent email and internet access.
  12. Allowance will be made for the diversity profile of students in accordance with the University strategy. 

Minimum admissions requirements

  1. BComHons in Mathematical Statistics
    or 
    Relevant honours degree
  2. A weighted average of at least 65% at honours level, but students with a weighted average of at least 70% will receive preference
  3. An average of at least 65% for the research component at honours level

Note:

  1. An admission examination may be rerquired
  2. Additional modules may be required in order to reach the desired level of competency

Other programme-specific information

As long as progress is satisfactory, renewal of registration of a master’s student will be accepted for a second year of study in the case of a full-time student. Renewal of registration for a third and subsequent years for a full-time student will only take place when Student Administration of the Faculty receives a written motivation (the required form can be obtained from the relevant head of department) that is supported by the relevant head of department and Postgraduate Studies Committee. Refer to General Academic Regulation G32.

Fundamental modules

  • Module content:

    A compulsory bootcamp must be attended as part of this module –  usually presented during the last week of January each year. Details regarding the venue and specific dates are made available by the department each year. The bootcamp will cover the basics of research to prepare students for the research component of their degree. Students can be exempt from the bootcamp if it was already attended in a previous year or for a previous degree. Each year of registration for the master’s degree will also require the attendance of three departmental seminars. Students should ensure that their attendance is recorded by the postgraduate co-ordinator present at the seminars. The department approves the seminars attended. Students are also required to present their mini-dissertation research proposal within the department or at a conference.

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Core modules

Elective modules

  • Module content:

    Unsupervised learning: deterministic clustering, model-based clustering, latent class and behavioural analytics, dimension reduction. Natural language processing and topic modelling; recommender systems. Organisation of data, data wrangling and data structure exploration.

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  • Module content:

    This module covers the most recent literature that discusses current and contemporary research topics in advanced data analytics.

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  • Module content:

    Difference equations. Lag operators. Stationary ARMA processes. Maximum likelihood estimation. Spectral analysis.  Vector processes. Non-stationary time series. Long-memory processes.

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  • Module content:

    Supervised learning and applications. Multicollinearity, ridge regression, the LASSO and the elastic net. Parametric and nonparametric logistic regression and nonlinear regression. Survival regression. Regression extensions: Random forests MARS and Conjoint analysis. Neural networks.

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  • Module content:

    Reviewing, from a statistical perspective, the cyber-infrastructure ecosystem including distributed computing, multi node and distributed file eco systems, such as Amazon Web Services. Structured and unstructured data sources, including social media data and image data. Setting up of large data structures for analysis. Algorithms and techniques for computing statistics and statistical models on distributed data. Software to be used include, Hadoop, Map reduce, SAS, SAS Data loader for Hadoop.

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General Academic Regulations and Student Rules
The General Academic Regulations (G Regulations) and General Student Rules apply to all faculties and registered students of the University, as well as all prospective students who have accepted an offer of a place at the University of Pretoria. On registering for a programme, the student bears the responsibility of ensuring that they familiarise themselves with the General Academic Regulations applicable to their registration, as well as the relevant faculty-specific and programme-specific regulations and information as stipulated in the relevant yearbook. Ignorance concerning these regulations will not be accepted as an excuse for any transgression, or basis for an exception to any of the aforementioned regulations. The G Regulations are updated annually and may be amended after the publication of this information.

Regulations, degree requirements and information
The faculty regulations, information on and requirements for the degrees published here are subject to change and may be amended after the publication of this information.

University of Pretoria Programme Qualification Mix (PQM) verification project
The higher education sector has undergone an extensive alignment to the Higher Education Qualification Sub-Framework (HEQSF) across all institutions in South Africa. In order to comply with the HEQSF, all institutions are legally required to participate in a national initiative led by regulatory bodies such as the Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET), the Council on Higher Education (CHE), and the South African Qualifications Authority (SAQA). The University of Pretoria is presently engaged in an ongoing effort to align its qualifications and programmes with the HEQSF criteria. Current and prospective students should take note that changes to UP qualification and programme names, may occur as a result of the HEQSF initiative. Students are advised to contact their faculties if they have any questions.

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