Education, Early Childhood & Youth

Are you interested in understanding the pressures and stresses on children and young people today and helping work out solutions to their problems?

You develop a broad understanding of childhood and youth in its social, historical and cultural context. This complements knowledge, insights and methods from the social sciences and humanities, including studies in education, social policy and children’s rights.

Your dissertation and module options offer you the chance to specialise in areas as diverse as mentoring, education and safeguarding, and you develop analytical skills to understand and appraise critically policies which affect children and young people in a range of settings.

Once qualified, you are perfectly placed to further your study in this area, or work in a huge range of jobs where care of children is paramount, including fostering, adoption, local authority, children's trusts or educational support roles.

How you learn

Under the guidance of experienced and committed staff, your learning involves a combination of lectures, seminars, workshops and guided reading. In lectures, specific information is delivered to larger groups while in the smaller seminar groups issues can be explored in more depth. Workshops are informal sessions in which you can extend your knowledge or seek further clarification of issues. Apart from scheduled teaching sessions, staff are readily available to provide further academic support and guidance. Some modules make use of a variety of guest speakers, such as academics and practitioners, to deliver lectures which enhances your learning experience and broadens your education.

How you are assessed

Assessment is varied and includes essays, case studies, literature reviews, essay plans, presentations, examinations and a dissertation. You also undertake 'formative' assessments, tasks which do not count towards your overall mark but provide you with feedback so you can realise your full potential in those assessments that do count.

Career opportunities

This programme will provide skills and knowledge for those aiming to work across a growing range of posts in the statutory and voluntary sector which look at children and young people holistically. Completion of this degree will support potential careers for those wishing to work in children’s trusts or other holistic services, educational support roles in schools and colleges, youth support roles in public services (such as children’s trusts, extended services, health promotion), children and young people development roles in the police, probation and local authority, youth support services within social services, fostering, adoption, and residential care and voluntary sector projects for the homeless, addressing substance misuse, community cohesion, domestic violence and community development needs.

Entry requirements

A typical offer is 220 tariff points from at least two A levels (or equivalent). You must have five GCSEs including English at grade C (or equivalent). We recommend an Access course if you're a mature student.

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