Contact Information:

Andy Downton

Professor A. C. Downton,
BSc PhD CEng FIEE SMIEEE
Pro Vice Chancellor (Academic Standards)
 

Department of Electronic Systems Engineering
University of Essex
Wivenhoe Park, Colchester, Essex CO4 3SQ, UK
Tel: (01206) 872910 Int: +44 1206 872910
Fax: (01206) 872900 Int: +44 1206 872900
Email: acd (Non-Essex users should add @essex.ac.uk to create a full email address

Secretary/PA:
Mrs Sheila Allison
Tel: (01206) 872065 Int: +44 1206 872065
Email: sheilaa (Non-Essex users should add @essex.ac.uk to create a full email address

Biography      Research      Teaching      Administration     Personal & Family

Biography

I was educated at Southampton University, where I obtained a first class honours degree in Electronic Engineering in 1974, and a PhD in 1982. From 1974-1976 I worked in industry at the Lucas Group Research Centre. I returned to Southampton University in 1976 as a research fellow, and was appointed a lecturer in the Department of Electronics in 1978. In 1986 I moved to the University of Essex as a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Electronic Systems Engineering. In 1995 I was promoted to a personal Chair, and I was Head of the Department of Electronic Systems Engineering from 1999-2004. My current research interests are in Document Analysis and Handwriting Recognition, Parallel Processing, Hardware/software Co-design and Real-Time Systems, and Human-Computer Systems generally.  I am a Chartered Engineer and Fellow of the Institution of Electrical Engineers (IEE) and a Senior Member of the IEEE, and have served on several IEE professional groups, including Image Processing (PGE4), Human-Computer Interaction (PGC5) and Speech and Language Processing (PGA5). I'm currently also an Institutional Auditor for the QAA, and a member of the IEE Accreditation Panel.

I'm married to Pippa, a General Medical Practitioner in Colchester, and have three children, Polly (21), Matthew (19) and Christopher (16). In my spare time from work and repairing our 17th Century farmhouse, I'm a Squash fanatic.

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Research

Current and Recent Projects:

  • OSCAR (Offline Script and Character Recognition Toolkit)

  • PSTESPA (Parallel Software Tools for Embedded Signal Processing Applications)

  • VIADOCS (Versatile Interactive Archive Document Conversion System

  • RAPPID (Software components for Rapid Parallel Prototyping in the Image/Multimedia Domain)

Recent Publications

Multimedia Architectures Laboratory 

 

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Teaching

Most of my lecturing is in the areas of Computer Engineering, Software Engineering, Real-Time Systems, Computer Networks and Human-Computer Interaction. In recent years I have lectured:

  EE108/9/10 Introduction to Networks

  EE247 Computer Engineering

  EE307 Computer Engineering

  EE212 Human-Computer Interaction

  EE406 Advanced Computer Architectures

  EE408 Real-Time Computing

  EE105 Digital Systems Design

My current lecturing is limited by my role as Pro Vice Chancellor to EE105.

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Management and Administration

As Pro-Vice Chancellor (Academic Standards), I am responsible for:

  All aspects of academic standards, including:

  • accreditation by professional bodies

  • degree scheme reviews

  • external examiners and their reports

  • QAA processes, including Institutional Audit

  • student assessment of teaching and student satisfaction surveys

  Learning and teaching

  Collaborative provision with our current partners:

  • Writtle College

  • South East Essex College (SEEC)

  • Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust

  • Colchester Institute

  • and any future partners...

  Student employability and careers

  Student retention

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Personal and Family

Web pages for the rest of my family, pictures of our house, and other social interest (or, fun with the digital camera!).

Andy Downton

Last Revised: 30 November 2004                                                                          Back to Top