Undergraduate Courses

Accreditation

• British Computer Society (BCS)
• Institute of Engineering and Technology (IET)

British Computer Society (BCS)

Membership

The School encourages students undertaking BSc schemes to become a student member of the British Computer Society, the Chartered Engineering Institution for Information Systems Engineering. Student members are members of the BCS Young Professionals Group.

Further information and application forms are available from the General Office (4.514) or from Mr Iain Langdon (5B.521).

General information on the British Computer Society, particularly the advantages of student membership, is available at:

www.bcs.org

Information about the local (Essex) branch of the BCS is available at:

www.essex.bcs.org

The Branch holds many events throughout the year some of which are based at the University Campus. Details are publicised on the University Intranet and on the Branch Web site.

Accreditation

The BCS offers exemption from its professional examinations to students following accredited degrees. At its last accreditation visit during the academic year 2006-07, approval was granted for the School’s schemes as follows:

Undergraduate schemes

Full Exemption from the BCS Professional Examinations is granted to the following schemes, in full-time mode for students who started their degrees on or before October 2007, as follows:

BSc (Hons) Computer Science conditionally
BSc (Hons) Software Engineering conditionally
BSc (Hons) Computer Science (Artificial Intelligence) conditionally
BSc (Hons) Computer Science (Embedded Systems and Robotics) conditionally
BSc (Hons) Computer Science (Internet Technology) conditionally

Conditions for all degrees:

Students must pass, at the first attempt, a practical problem-solving project in the final year. Additionally all the above schemes provide partial academic fulfilment for CEng/CSci.

From October 2008 the School is also offering some further, or revised, degree schemes:

BSc (Hons) Internet Technology
BSc (Hons) Artificial Intelligence and Robotics
BSc (Hons) Computer Games
BSc (Hons) Computers and Electronics (from October 2009)
BSc (Hons) Information and Communication Technologies (from October 2009)

These schemes will be reviewed by the BCS during their next visit in 2011. However, having had discussions with the BCS, it is our expectation that all the schemes will benefit from similar accreditation as before, which will be applied retrospectively during their visit in 2011.

Institute of Engineering and Technology (IET)

Membership

The IET is the UK body which accredits undergraduate degrees in electrical and electronic engineering. You can have complete confidence that the degrees we offer meet the highest standards required for education and training by the Electronic Engineering profession.

The School encourages students undertaking BEng schemes to become a Student Member of the IET.

IET literature is available at: www.theiet.org.

You can choose to join the IET at any time during your course but obviously the sooner you join the sooner you benefit from membership. In order to become a Student member you can complete an online registration form at http://www.theiet.org/membership/join/.

Locally the IET Suffolk Branch and IET Colchester Younger Members organise a number of meetings here at the University. The topics selected for these evening meetings are of broad interest to all students on our courses. The IET Suffolk and the IET Ipswich Younger Members (SYM) (Ipswich) also organise meetings in the Ipswich area and the IET Essex Branch organises meetings in Chelmsford. Whether or not you choose to become a Student member of the IET you are welcome to attend any of these events which will be publicised in the School by posters and also via email. Details of local IET meetings and details of student bursaries can also be found on the IET notice board.

If you join as a Student member you will be automatically transferred to the class of Member of the IET (MIEE) when you graduate. After some further study (for example an MSc) and a number of years in a responsible position (meaning you will typically be in your early thirties), you can apply to be become a Chartered Engineer.

Further information is available from Dr Ramaswamy Palaniappan.

Accreditation

All our BEng degrees have received formal accreditation from the IET on behalf of the UK Engineering Council. This means that a graduate from these degree programmes will have satisfied to BEng level the education requirements to allow them to apply to become a Chartered Engineer once they have completed further educational training at Masters level and have 4 years of appropriate responsible experience. At its last accreditation visit during the academic year 2005-06, approval was granted for the School’s schemes from the 2005 intake up to and including the 2009 intake, as follows:

Undergraduate Programmes

• BEng Electronic Engineering
• BEng Audio Engineering
• BEng Telecommunications Engineering
• BEng Computers and Telecommunications
• BEng Optoelectronics and Communication Systems
• BEng Computer Engineering
• BEng Computer Games and Internet Technology
• BEng Computers and Networks
• BEng Computers and Network Security
• BEng Networks and Internet Technology