Information Technology Moves Fast. Alex Wanted Lecturers Who Could Keep Up

Bachelor of Information Technology (Big Data and Analytics) student Alex Nicolaou chose ICMS after a false start in another degree, and he credits one thing above all for making the second attempt stick: learning from lecturers with industry experience. 

For Alex, that mattered more than it might sound.

Technology changes quickly, and he says learning from people still connected to the field helped keep his studies relevant rather than theoretical.  

In Information Technology (IT), he notes, what you learn in first year can feel almost outdated by third year. 

A science kid who found his fit in IT

Alex did not arrive at IT by a straight line. A former student of St Augustine’s College, Brookvale, who graduated in 2020, he first enrolled in a Cyber Security degree at Macquarie University before moving to ICMS. 

Through high school he was a science student, working across chemistry, biology and physics.

He liked logic and problem-solving, but somewhere between Year 11 and Year 12, science started to feel like the wrong fit. 

IT, he found, offered the same puzzle-solving without the parts of science that had stopped clicking. 

Learning from lecturers still in the field

The turning point at ICMS was Alex’s experience of learning from lecturers with industry experience, including people still working in the field or with experience running businesses and tech projects. 

“Learning from people who were still in the field kept things relevant, not theoretical,” Alex said. 

For Alex, lecturers bringing their industry experience into the classroom helped connect what he was learning with how the sector operates in practice. 

Small classes and responsive faculty

Alex also points to ICMS class sizes as a reason he stayed on track.

In smaller groups, he says, asking a question felt far less daunting than being lost in a lecture hall of hundreds. 

“Small class sizes meant lecturers actually knew my name, knew what I was struggling with, and could adjust rather than just ploughing through slides,” he said. 

Alex remembers when emails he sent late at night were answered within minutes, an experience that contributed to his view of faculty as responsive and accessible.  

His advice to first-year students is to make full use of the resources available, because his experience was that the lecturers wanted to help him grow, not simply pass. 

A background that transfers

For Alex, switching from science was not wasted effort. He says the analytical thinking he built in high school transferred well into IT. 

“You’re not starting from zero; you’re just pointing it somewhere new,” he said. 

He also pushes back on the idea that IT means talking only to a screen.

In his view, the work is about problem-solving, communication, and being useful to people who do not understand the technology themselves. 

His advice to future students

Alex encourages students weighing up their options to accept that changing direction is not a failure.

For Alex, changing direction ultimately helped him find a field that felt like the right fit. 

“ICMS gave me the space to make that pivot without feeling like I was throwing away everything I’d worked toward in high school,” he said. 

His closing message is simple: choose something you are curious enough about to keep going on the hard days, because there will be a few. 

Disclaimer: The views and experiences expressed in this article are those of the student and reflect their individual experience at ICMS. Results and experiences may vary.