BEng Communications Engineering (Including Foundation Year)

Our BEng Communications Engineering (including foundation year) is open to Home and EU students. It will be suitable for you if your academic qualifications do not yet meet our entrance requirements for the three-year version of this course and you want a programme that increases your subject knowledge as well as improves your English language and academic skills.

This four-year course includes a foundation year (Year Zero), followed by a further three years of study. During your Year Zero, you study four academic subjects relevant to your chosen course as well as a compulsory English language and academic skills module.

You are an Essex student from day one, a member of our global community based at the most internationally diverse campus university in the UK.

After successful completion of Year Zero in our Essex Pathways Department, you progress to complete your course with the Department of Computer Science and Electronic Engineering. It's hard to imagine a world without mobile networks, the internet, radio, or audio-visual appliances. Bringing together knowledge from both electrical engineering and computer science, communications engineers drive these communications systems which are so fundamental to the modern world.

You study a wide range of topics in communications, including:

• Radio frequency circuits and systems
• The transmission of digital signals over analogue links
• The transfer of audio-visual information

You also cover traditional topics in electronics, including signal processing, circuit design, processors and software.

You graduate prepared to move into relevant roles across almost every industry.

Programming at Essex

Teaching someone to programme is about opening a door. In Year 1 at Essex you will study a module that introduces you to programming using Python. We assess your ability to think in a programmatic way in the very first week of term and if you require additional support, we offer classes which will boost your skills and confidence with programming.

• We are ranked 6th in the UK for research power in computer science (Times Higher Education research power measure, Research Excellence Framework 2021).
• Guarantee your place on your chosen course if you successfully complete your foundation year at Essex.
• Small class sizes allow you to work closely with your teachers and classmates.

Previous university/college study is required in addition to local high school qualifications for our Undergraduate Bachelor degree courses.

We accept a number of international qualifications, including the International Baccalaureate with the majority of our courses requiring a grade 30 or above or the SATR with the majority of our courses requiring a minimum of 1100 out of 1600 with 550 in each test.

Demand for electronics and communications engineers is high; the IT and engineering sectors are growing at a rate that outstrips the supply of fresh talent.

The profession offers a range of careers from design and development to marketing, management, production engineering and applications engineering. Graduates also find employment in other disciplines because of the highly numerate nature of the subject.

Our department has a large pool of external contacts, ranging from companies providing robots for the media industry, through vehicle diagnostics, to electronic system design and circuit design and manufacture, who work with us and our students to provide advice, placements and eventually graduate opportunities. Read more about computer science and electronic engineering career destinations here.

Many of our graduates have gone on to work with BT, whose research centre is located just 30 minutes from the Colchester campus. Other recent graduates have gone on to work for a wide range of high-profile companies including:

• National Instruments
• Circad Design Ltd
• McLaren Formula One Team
• B&W Group
• IBM
• Visa
• Google

We also work with our University's Student Development Team to help you find out about further work experience, internships, placements, and voluntary opportunities.

UCAS

Applications to UCAS are open for 2023-24 entry. Applications are made online via the UCAS Apply and UCAS Hub, where you will be charged a small fee for processing your application. Here you will be able to fill out your details, upload your personal statement, choose the universities you would like to apply for, and track your application status.

It’s important that you complete your application fully to give us all the information we need to make a decisions as quickly as possible. A few key things that we will need are:

• Details of all qualifications, including those you may have not finished yet and any predicted grades
• Your personal statement (we have some tips for this)
• A suitable reference – if this is not provided or does not meet our requirements this may be a condition of any offer made and will be required before your place can be confirmed.

The UCAS code for Essex is ESSEX E70. Our individual campus codes for our Loughton and Southend campuses are ‘L’ and ‘S’ respectively. There is no campus code for Colchester – please leave this blank in your application.