I'm not sure of the price of the course as I beleieve that they put the price up recently.
Accommodation is expensive around Kingston, but the only times that you HAVE to turn up is to deliver the group project presentation, the end of first year exams, then the individual project presenatation and finally, the end of year 2 exams.
You do not have to turn up to any of the lectures, all the study material is made available on line. When you register, you are given a recommended reading list. Personally, the only one I bought was Exploring Corporate Strategy by Johnson & Scholes for the business studies module. Everyting else is available on line now. Wikipedia rules!!!
I would recommend that you turned up for the technology lecture week in the first year, lots of maths. The second module in the first year is an extended romp through air leg and basic aircraft engineering principles, NDT, planning, etc. So depending on your knowledge of these subjects I would give it a miss. The group project presentation is delivered during the second module week of the first year.
Year 2 I would turn up for both the modules. The business studies week is first and I thought was the best one of the four. The last module is Quality Systems, such as Six Sigma, continuous improvement methods, etc. I needed as much info on these subjects as I could get. The handouts on the Quality module was sufficient to study for the exam, so no need to buy any books.
In the first year you will have to team up with a number of your fellow students, who you may not know and produce a group project. This project is chosen amongst the group and must be relevant and have sufficient technical and academic merit for it to be accepted by the University. The group project is the one that absorbs the most time, not just in the writing but also arranging meetings with the other members of the group, all of which have to be minuted and agendas agreed, etc. Big pain in the arse. You also have to write a log book of the project, which is a diary of the project, what you did, any people you had meetings with, any research you did on the project, sketches, ideas, it was endless. I would say that in the first year I was averaging 10-15 hours a week on University stuff. Writing assignments, researching for the project, writing the project, reading up on various subjects, studying for exams, etc.
It is a relief to get the first year out of the way.
The second year is much calmer, the individual project takes up less time and the assignments for the modules were easier to compile because I was more used to it. The exams were easier too.
I seemed to have banged on a bit. Hope this helps.....