DSP literacy: a must for first-year engineering students

At the Polytechnic of Central London (PCL), there is a very strong emphasis on DSP with all-through study provision starting at first-year undergraduate level on to an MSc in digital signal processing systems and PhD-level research. The authors focus on just one part of this scenario: the BEng undergraduate programme, in which DSP accounts for around 15% of the total study programme. This consistent emphasis on DSP provides an excellent vehicle for promoting a systems-level viewpoint, underpinned by a fairly demanding design/analysis approach, which relates comfortably to the study of allied topics such as microelectronics, where nowadays a hierarchical top-down conceptualization/bottom-up understanding procedural framework is essential. The authors describe the modules taught in each year of the course and then discuss the first year of the course in more detail