One of the key differences at Imperial was a higher emphasis on independent learning. At MIT, though self-driven studying has been important, I was very much used to a collaborative environment and strong support network of professors, TAs, and other students. The contact time for classes at Imperial were only 1 or 2 lectures a week (at least for my year 3 and 4 classes). No recitations, no (or few classes with) scheduled lab sessions, minimally available office hours. This encourages students to do most of their learning and reinforcement of concepts on their own time.
I did enjoy the breadth of classes offered in my departments (EEE, and by extension, CS). There weren’t hard prerequisites, so I did have the opportunity to try my hand at different things pretty easily.
