Looks like it relied on the medics turning out.

Can anyone tell me which departments made up- or still make up- the Royal college of Science? Is maths included or is it part of city and guilds?

thanks

Biology, Biochemistry, Chemistry, JMC, Physics and indeed Maths make up the RCS.

The department used to be part of City and Guilds in the distant past but jumped ship to a far superior Constituent College!

They still help the engineers learn maths though.

That's wrong unfortunately:

Royal College of Chemistry - formed 1844

Royal College of Chemistry merges with Goverment school of mines and science applied to the arts

Physical Science Departments demerge from GSM to from the Normal College of Science.

The GSM is the forerunner of RSM

The RCC/NSM is the forerunner of the RCS

They merged back together, along with C&G to form IC.

The maths department help engineers learn maths?

Hmm, they may lecture it but as far as I remember half the maths they taught had no use on my engineering course and now has even less use in the real world, all it seemed to do was make the lecturers smug that they could confuse us faster than any other lecturer. The theories they taught were about as relevant to engineering as a media studies course is to becomming a surgeon.

And all the maths they taught was badly taught, any understanding I got in the subject was found elsewhere the lectures and tutorials were about as much use to an engineering student as a match is underwater.

So anyone who thinks the maths department helps engineers in any practical way, you are just plain wrong.

Jackson - As I understand it, your engineering course relied on a number of concepts taken directly from Physics, and Physics (as a subject) involves a large amount of Maths.

As a side note, maybe it would be an idea to give the engineers extra tuition in English, as this might help to correct their spelling and grammar.

Physicist, I'm not arguing that maths does not have a large role to play in engineering. What I was saying is that the teaching of it from the maths department to engineers did little to give the engineers the knowledge of the subject we needed. If the maths department had taught us the things that are useful and taught us them well then I would have no argument with Richard's comment that they help to teach us maths, but they do neither.

chris j-

you just sound bitter that you got c**p marks in maths.

its not that hard, even engineers can learn some

I got very good marks in Maths (90%), however still believe that the external teaching done by the maths department is often poor. Maths can't teach engineers, they can teach mathematicians. It's not that they can't teach, they just can't teach in an appropriate manner. I had a very good lecturer from maths in my second year, however there is a very good reason why one of my first year courses is now taught by my department rather than maths.