This specialist degree should interest and benefit a broad range of students. If you are already professionally qualified having taken the Bar Professional Training Course (BPTC) or Legal Practice Course (LPC) it will develop your understanding of practice and enhance your career. If you have legal qualifications in another jurisdiction it will provide understanding of legal process in England. You can join the course straight after a law degree, but some experience of legal practice is an advantage.
The course offers you a skills-based and practice-focused approach to the subject of advocacy in a legal professional setting. You will have the opportunity to study how inquiry and dispute resolution procedures in the civil and criminal justice systems are best managed to produce the best outcome for stakeholders.
Each year a small number of internships become available and you will be provided with information about such opportunities and how to apply during the year of your study.
As a City Law School student you will benefit from everything the Institution has to offer including the Learning Success department and Lawbore, an online resource designed to help you find the information you need for the course modules. All course modules have online depositories through Moodle.
The City Law School has its own dedicated administration team and you also have access to two legal libraries, one at the Gray’s Inn campus and the other based on site at our Northampton Square campus.
As part of the University of London you can also become a member of Senate House Library for free with your student ID card.
Our excellent location in London puts us within walking distance of the British Librarywhich has a collection of over 150 million items and extensive law resources.
This course is taught by leading academics as well as visiting practitioners including barristers and solicitors who work in private practice and in legal departments of major companies.
All modules are structured as 10 weekly two-hour seminars which comprise both lectures as well as interactive tutorials. All modules are supported by our online learning platform - Moodle. Assessment is by way of coursework which comprises 100% of the final mark in each module. Each module carries the same weight in terms of the overall qualification.
You will be allocated a dedicated supervisor for your dissertation who will help you develop a specific topic and provide support in terms of resources, content and structure.
As with all LLM specialisms at City, University of London, you may take either five modules and a shorter dissertation (10,000 words) or four modules and a longer dissertation (20,000 words).
All modules are of the same duration and are taught per term (September – December or January – April) rather than the whole academic year. If you take four modules you will take two per term in each term and if you take five modules you will have three in one term and two in the other.
Dissertations are written during the summer term when there are no classes.
In order to obtain this specialism, you must choose at least three modules from within this specialism and write your dissertation on a subject within the specialism.
Specialism modules
For your remaining modules you can choose from more than 50 modules covering a diverse range of subjects.
As a graduate of this specialist LLM you will be well placed to pursue careers in this area of law in private practice, in-house in a law firm, policy and government, non-governmental organisations and a wide range of non-legal careers in the field of advocacy.
With so much competition for those seeking to enter and develop a career in the legal profession, this LLM is designed to provide a depth of understanding and a range of skills that can make a real difference in building your career.
The City Law School has a vibrant Pro Bono programme including our award-winning commercial law clinic for tech start-ups Start-Ed.
A master’s degree in law is a fantastic way for law graduates to develop a specialisation, or for non-lawyers working in related fields to gain a deeper understanding of legal issues.
This LLM pathway is a unique course that allows you to specialise in human rights from a highly practical perspective; the focus on advocacy translates into valuable clinical skills that enable you to put your knowledge of human rights law into practice. You’ll study the core principles of human rights advocacy, rooted in knowledge of the European Convention on Human Rights, developing expertise in an increasingly vital area of law that has implications for individuals throughout the world facing discrimination and persecution.
Alongside the optional modules, you may choose to either write a 15,000 word dissertation or conduct a work-based project that will give you valuable experience of dealing with a specific legal issue in detail.
The course is perfect for lawyers and law graduates looking for career development, although all of our LLM courses can be studied by students without a background in law, since you will be trained in the necessary analytical and legal skills.
As such, the programme will also provide ideal training for paralegals, journalists, NGO and charity workers, policy advisors, consultants, lawyers, those working in business and finance, or anyone who will benefit from a legal education in their career.
If your goal is to become a barrister, the Bar Professional Training Course (BPTC) at Manchester Law School is designed to provide you with the best possible skills, experience and training to prepare you for a successful career. We offer advocacy training and group sessions that offer true-to-life mock trials, assessments, 'mini chambers' and real-life legal work experience opportunities.
Manchester Law School has a proud history of providing barrister training in the North West and as a result has outstanding links to both the local legal profession and the Northern Circuit (Chambers in Cheshire, Liverpool, Manchester and Preston). Practitioners from the Northern Circuit will provide you with Additional Advocacy Classes for students and are on-hand at regular events to offer advice about your future as a barrister and obtaining pupillage.
You can expect exceptionally high standards of tutoring and a wealth of pro bono opportunity. We will support you preparing pupillage applications, with access to our specialist careers service.
Specialist BPTC facilities
Recognising the challenging nature of barrister training, the Law School offers a number of specialist facilities for the use of students on the BPTC programme. Students benefit from specialist postgraduate study areas, personal chambers rooms, legal libraries, personal study areas plus a mock courtroom where students can practice their advocacy skills in a realistic legal environment.
Advocacy
We will provide you with the opportunity to hone your advocacy skills with many opportunities to understand the skills involved and to put them into practice. Our advocacy sessions far exceed the minimum hours set by the Bar Standards Board (BSB) and we are very proud of the skills that our students develop during the course. You will receive approximately 42 hours of criminal and civil advocacy plus assessments, which is over three times the minimum required by the BSB. We also offer Additional Classes with barristers who are in full time practice to give you further opportunities to develop your advocacy skills.
Additional Professional Programme (APP)
An innovative feature of Manchester Law School’s BPTC programme. The APP bridges the gap between student and professional life, and prepares you for the Bar. There is a whole range of extra curricula, career-boosting activities of which you can take advantage. From guest lectures provided by judges and clerks of chambers, to Pro Bono opportunities, the Student Law Society, mooting and other national competitions.
Practitioner Mentor Scheme
Each chambers group is allocated their own Practitioner Mentor, a locally based barrister who will be on hand to guide you along the path to practice.
Mediator Training Programme
We are exclusively offering the option to gain an additional independent professional qualification in mediation through the ADR group, normally costing £2,750 +VAT, at no extra cost to our BPTC students. The programme is practically orientated and focused on equipping you with the skills you need to perform well at mediation – either as a representative or as a mediator – and leads to ADR Group Accredited Mediator Status.
Award-winning Faculty environment
At Manchester Law School you will have access to an outstanding Faculty building, housing spacious study and IT zones, laptop counters, cafes and coffee shops, and free WiFi. You will benefit from highly modern facilities on our thriving campus too, at the heart of the UK’s second city.
The BPTC focuses on developing highly practical skills and features an innovative 'mini-chambers' approach designed to mirror the real life working practices of a barrister. You will be placed in a group (or chambers) with 11 other students and be provided with a permanent, multimedia-equipped base room. You will be expected to 'perform' regularly in front of your fellow students to encourage the development of strong working relationships similar to a professional chambers.
The BPTC begins with a participative and dynamic induction programme introducing students to the highly practical BPTC, compared with academic study. Students are almost immediately offered the opportunity to network with local practitioners during a team building exercise and social event. Following this induction, the remainder of the course features a combination of compulsory subjects and an opportunity to study two subjects of your choice, depending on your particular career aspirations.
The BPTC is designed for aspiring barristers. It attracts students from around the world and from all parts of the UK. Students will have already completed a qualifying law degree or a non-law degree plus a Graduate Diploma in Law.
From recent graduates to doctors and front bench opposition MPs, the programme caters both for those who have always been dedicated to a professional legal career as well as people seeking a career change, and those who are able to make use of the training together with a professional legal qualification in business, management or administration.
In particular, the course is designed for students who want to develop their skills as advocates, and those who want to research and apply the law to help clients in presenting legal cases in court. Bar students often have a deep commitment to helping those who need assistance in protecting their legal rights.
The course offers two possible routes:
1) Postgraduate Diploma in Bar Professional Training (the BPTC) - If you successfully complete the compulsory taught elements (150 credits) you will be awarded the Postgraduate Diploma and will be certified as having completed the Bar Professional Training Course. This is the compulsory vocational qualification required to be eligible to be Called to the Bar of England and Wales.
2) LLM in Bar Professional Training - This is the BPTC together with an additional 30-credit practice-focused dissertation. You will research and write the dissertation following the compulsory taught elements of the course in order to achieve a Master’s Degree. There is no extra fee for doing so.
The Bar Professional Training Course is a rigorous programme designed to reflect the modern working Bar. We replicate life in chambers, so you learn how to represent a range of clients and to prepare for the demands of court.
Studying at Gray's Inn Place, in the heart of legal London, City Law School students achieve impressive academic success. In 2015, our students represented half of the national BPTC cohort achieving a grade of ‘outstanding’* – the most prominent indicator of success in securing future pupillage.
* Bar Standards Board BPTC Key Statistics report 2016
The programme is taught by a team of professionally-qualified experts who are the authors of the BPTC manuals in use across the country. Internationally renowned and highly skills focused, City’s BPTC provides a bridge between academic legal study and professional practice and covers three essential areas:
Underpinning all of these areas is a foundation of analysis and legal research, combined with the need to set priorities and organise your work in order to meet deadlines.
Our BPTC offers:
The LLM in Bar Professional Training satisfies all the requirements of a traditional LLM but has a primary focus on practice. In addition to the taught classes on the BPTC, the LLM gives you the chance to focus on a specific area of professional legal practice related to the BPTC and to strengthen your knowledge and understanding of that area. This can be linked to pupillage applications, to underline a commitment to a particular area, or can be used more generally to enhance your CV.
City’s BPTC is accredited by the Bar Standards Board (BSB). The BSB sets out the education and training requirements for becoming a barrister, which means once you graduate, and provided you complete the Inns qualifying sessions, you are qualified for Call to the Bar.
The BPTC comprises compulsory modules (based on the Bar Standards Board requirements) and, in the term third, two options.
The course has been developed to give you the relevant legal skills and knowledge that all newly qualified barristers need. While there is a strong focus on advocacy, advisory and drafting skills are also important as well as knowledge of court procedures and evidence and the principles governing ADR and professional ethics.
Three of the option subjects (FRU, domestic violence and social security) are pro bono based, which gives you the opportunity to get real-life experience as part of the programme.
There is a strong focus on preparation, participation and practice. Students are encouraged to recognise that work on the programme is set in a realistic context and to approach the work in a professional, ethical, practical and problem-solving way.
Core subjects for the postgraduate diploma (BPTC)
Other important areas covered within the context of the main subjects:
This course combines the Bar Professional Training Course (BPTC) and further LLM elements of study. If you have ambitions of becoming a barrister, and are interested in developing advanced Masters-level legal research skills, this course gives you the opportunity to achieve both.
The BPTC element of this combined course is designed to prepare you for life as a barrister. The BPTC at Manchester Law School is focused on building highly practical skills and features an innovative ‘mini-chambers’ approach, designed to mirror the real-life practices of a barrister. You will be expected to ‘perform’ regularly in front of your fellow students to encourage the development of strong working relationships, similar to those of a professional chambers.
The LLM element of this course includes research methods study and an assessed research proposal leading to a supervised, assessed dissertation or research project of 15,000 words. You will be supervised by an experienced member of the teaching team.
LL.M in Legal Practice at the Bar allows you to develop good practical skills and to have gained advanced research skills and an ability to engage in critical thinking and knowledge application in specialist legal areas.
The LLM in Legal Practice at the Bar (combined LLM/BPTC) course is eligible for the Postgraduate Loan Scheme from the UK government, and may be offered to residents of the UK and EU. Find out more about your eligibility here.
Recognising the challenging nature of barrister training, the Law School offers a number of specialist facilities for the use of students on the BPTC programme. Students benefit from specialist postgraduate study areas, personal chambers rooms, legal libraries, personal study areas plus a mock courtroom where students can practice their advocacy skills in a realistic legal environment.
We will provide you with the opportunity to hone your advocacy skills with many opportunities to understand the skills involved and to put them into practice. Our advocacy sessions far exceed the minimum hours set by the Bar Standards Board (BSB) and we are very proud of the skills that our students develop during the course.
You will receive approximately 42 hours of criminal and civil advocacy plus assessments, which is over three times the minimum required by the BSB. We also offer Additional Classes with barristers who are in full time practice to give you further opportunities to develop your advocacy skills.
An innovative feature of Manchester Law Schools BPTC programme. The APP bridges the gap between student and professional life, and prepares you for the Bar. There is a whole range of extra curricula, career-boosting activities of which you can take advantage. From guest lectures provided by judges and clerks of chambers, to Pro Bono opportunities, the Student Law Society, mooting and other national competitions.
Each chambers group is allocated their own Practitioner Mentor, a locally based barrister who will be on hand to guide you along the path to practice.
We are exclusively offering the option to gain an additional independent professional qualification in mediation through the ADR group, normally costing £2,750 +VAT, at no extra cost to our BPTC students. The programme is practically orientated and focused on equipping you with the skills you need to perform well at mediation either as a representative or as a mediator and leads to ADR Group Accredited Mediator Status.
Manchester Law School offers excellent Pro Bono opportunities, allowing students to undertake voluntary legal work with our partner organisations. Our dedicated careers adviser will provide assistance with finding mini pupillages and initiating new links to the profession. You will also receive support with careers from your tutors and you will have the opportunity to increase your network at our many events including external speakers and members of the Northern Circuit.
At Manchester Law School you will have access to an outstanding Faculty building, housing spacious study and IT zones, laptop counters, cafes and coffee shops, and free WiFi. You will benefit from highly modern facilities on our thriving campus too, at the heart of the UKs second city.
The MSc Health Policy will develop your understanding of, and critical engagement with, key challenges in health policy. Both state and non-state actors grapple with how best to promote the health of communities and populations, including the most effective strategies for preventing disease, ensuring efficient and high quality health care, and reducing health inequalities.
These challenges extend beyond the traditional domain of the health sector, requiring engagement with economic and social policy and a range of non-state actors including third sector organisations, commercial interests and international agencies.
The MSc in Health Policy is designed for individuals interested in a wide range of health-related roles including government and international agencies, health advocacy, health administration and health care delivery, consultancies, advisory roles, the commercial sector, and health-related research. Within the programme there is scope for you to specialise in either health systems or health inequalities, or to follow a broad policy stream.
The Health Systems stream is ideal for those seeking to work in health care policy, planning or management, in either the public or private sectors. It will expose you to different models of health care financing, purchasing and delivery, equipping them to engage with key contemporary challenges and debates including how to achieve sustainable health care financing, the role of the state in health care, the appropriate mix of public and private provision, and how best to achieve the goals of equity, efficiency and quality in health care delivery.
The Health Inequalities stream is ideal for those seeking to engage with health disparities both between and within countries, particularly those relating to inequities in social structures and power. In this stream you will explore evidence and policy responses to health inequalities across a range of axes, including class/socioeconomic position, ethnicity/race and gender, and will consider how health and its determinants are shaped by a range of influences including social and economic policy, commercial power and political conflict. This stream is particularly suited to those interested in working in policy, advocacy and research settings with a focus on health equity.
You may also elect to follow a broad policy stream within the MSc Health Policy, rather than specialising in health systems or health inequalities. This stream equips you with an understanding of how health policy fits within broader approaches to social and economic policy, and is particularly suitable for individuals wanting to work in public policy, advocacy or research.
Our students come from countries at all levels of economic development and from a wide range of disciplinary backgrounds, with many using the MSc as an investment to develop their careers or move into a more policy-focused role. While the programme has a strong policy focus, it also includes an academic orientation so is good preparation for further research at PhD level.
The MSc programme is situated within the Global Public Health Unit, which is located in University’s School of Social and Political Science rather than a medical school. This reflects our programme’s reach across traditional boundaries, linking policy analysis, public health, social policy, economics, sociology, medicine and epidemiology. The MSc programme offers innovative research-led teaching that draws on academic expertise from all these disciplines, while also benefitting from close links with the Centre for Population Health Sciences in the University's medical college.
You will complete one compulsory course and a number of option courses.
Following the taught courses, you will work towards an independently researched dissertation.
This programme is designed to equip you with the knowledge and critical skills you need to play a senior role in health policy, advocacy and research.
Specific aims are to:
This programme is intended to equip you with the skills and knowledge necessary to pursue employment positions in policy, advocacy and research roles relevant to health policy. Most students use the MSc as an investment to develop their careers or move into a more policy-focused area, including jobs with health agencies or consultancies, government departments, international organisations and third sector organisations. By combining an advanced degree from a world-leading university with expertise in an innovative field relevant to multiple policy agendas, students who successfully complete our programmes are well placed to secure interesting positions within an often very competitive area.
Our graduates in recent years have moved on to a range of exciting employment and research positions. These include positions with health departments and other government ministries in both high-income and developing countries; with agencies and donor organisations working in health care and health promotion; with international organisations and consultancy; research positions examining health systems for the European Union and other levels of regional governance; and employment in commercial sector organisations including pharmaceutical and other health-related companies.
All students have access to the Edinburgh University Careers Service during the programme and for two years after graduation.
This programme provides you with the necessary qualification to pursue a legal traineeship. Undertaken after obtaining your LLB, it is the next step towards a career as a solicitor or advocate in Scotland. Our aim is that the Glasgow Diploma comes to be regarded as the trademark of excellence, ensuring that you are not just employable but actively sought after by employers. It will equip you with the hands-on skills necessary to practise law as a “day one ready trainee” in the 21st century, as well as excellent opportunities to develop your own professional network to support you throughout your career.
You will take five core and three optional courses. The core courses are required by the Law Society of Scotland, which regulates Scotland’s legal profession. Optional courses allow you to select additional subjects of study that suit your areas of interest or meet the requirements of your future employers in the legal profession. Courses are delivered through a combination of online resources, e-modules, lectures and small group tutorials. As our programme aims to equip you with the abilities and attributes of a “day one ready trainee”, each course will enable you to develop not only your written communication skills, but your verbal communication skills. Tutors will expect you to come to each class prepared to contribute.
Students contemplating a career as an advocate in Scotland are required by the Faculty of Advocates to take courses in International Private Law and Roman Law. These can be studied at the University of Glasgow at the same time as undertaking the Diploma and at no additional cost.
Upon successful completion of the programme you will be eligible to progress through your traineeship to work as a solicitor or advocate in Scotland. The Diploma is a requirement for entry into these roles in the legal profession. The Diploma is a requirement for entry into these roles in the legal profession, in addition to providing employment opportunities in related legal disciplines. As well as working with colleagues in the School of Law and the University’s Career Service, we strive to increase your employability through our strong links across the legal profession by liaising with human resources and training partners in our tutors’ organisations. In addition, we run a series of networking events where you can meet lawyers from all areas of the industry and at all levels, from trainee to partner. Our goal is not only to prepare you for life as a trainee and to make you as attractive to employers as possible, but to support and guide you to help make the correct career choices.
The LLM in Access to Justice (A2J) is a distinct and unique clinical legal education course in Northern Ireland and on the island of Ireland, there being no comparable courses at undergraduate or postgraduate level. The course gives students the opportunity to develop legal advice and advocacy skills by allowing them to represent appellants in Industrial and Social Security Tribunals. Students will also have the opportunity to engage their interest in the provision of legal services more generally as they are required to develop and manage the ‘Ulster University Law Clinic’.
The function of the course is to supplement the existing range of legal service providers by focusing on, and meeting, ‘unmet legal need’ in the fields of employment law and social security law. In doing so, students are tasked to analyze ‘unmet legal need’, the availability and consumption of legal services and reflect on wider issues of access to justice, ‘equality of arms’, and dispute resolution.
Students are expected to attend all classes associated with the programme and be punctual and regular in attendance. In semester one, students will undertake taught modules in Social Security Law and Policy, Employment Law, Tribunal Representation and Alternative Dispute Resolution. Student will also begin clinical work placement with the Legal Support Project within the Law Centre (NI) in the area of Social Security and induction to the Ulster Law Clinic. In Semester 2 & 3, Students will be based at the Ulster Law Clinic and/or clinical work placement with the Legal Support Project for the Clinical Legal Practice module where they will provide advice and representation to users of the Law Clinic. Students will also undertake the taught module Housing Law and attend classes in the Dissertation module.
Student clinicans will have placement as volunteers with our placement partner at the pro-bono Legal Support Project at Law Centre (NI). Students will undertake training and will providing specialist legal advice and representation on social security cases.
Students can also engage in placement through collaboration with the Legal Support Officer at Citizens Advice Regional Office. Students would focus on providing support in Social Security Commissioner’s cases.
Students will undertake employment law cases through the Ulster Law Clinic.
The Clinic staff have recieved recognition through a variety of awards. The Course Team received the Distinguished Team Teaching Award in December 2014 from Ulster University, as well as Learning and Teaching Awards 2014 Course/School Team of the Year in the UUSU awards. Dr Eugene McNamee was the recipient of the US-UK Fulbright Public Sector Award 2014 - Scholar at Fordham Law School, NYC, 2015. Dr Esther McGuinness was runner up in the highly prestigious Law Teacher of the Year Award OUP.
Clinic staff continue to engage in leading research and justice innovations related to practical implications of, and solutions to, access to justice problems. The Clinic was awarded funding by the Legal Education Foundation to analyse the role of university law clinics in the UK in delivering access to justice. Dr Gráinne McKeever received funding from the British Academy/Leverhulme to understand how court litigants participate in court hearings. The Nuffield Foundation has awarded Dr Gráinne McKeever and Dr John McCord, in partnership with the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, to conduct a human rights analysis of the impact of litigants in person (LIPs) on the Northern Ireland court system. Ciaran White has engaged in research to review the access to justice barriers arising for deaf clients attending consultations with private solicitors in Northern Ireland.
You will develop skills highly relevant to legal practice, and to policy, research and advocacy roles in the voluntary, public and private sectors in the UK, Ireland and beyond. Successful completion may also open up a range of further study and research options.
The LLM A2J allows you to develop the analytical skills prized by employers in a wide range of career pathways within the United Kingdom, Ireland and internationally. Students obtain experience in all aspects of legal practice, from client-handling and case-related research, to advocacy and representation, as well as developing and managing a working Law Clinic. The degree is relevant to legal practice and policy, and to research and advocacy roles in the voluntary, public and private sectors. Successful completion also opens up a range of further study and research options.
We are proud to state that all our graduates to date have have transitioned into employment, practice or further academic study. The connections created by the referral network have generated opportunities for our graduates in the form of trainee solicitor positions with one of the members of our referral network, Sullivans Law, for example. Graduates have also been employed as research interns in the Law Society of Northern Ireland for the last two years. Other students have taken up funded PhDs examining issues and concepts arising from their LLM studies, and continued working across the legal advice field.
This MA looks at contemporary changes in media and communications, by putting into perspective the transformations that affect the way people live and work, national and international institutions evolve, and how cultural practices develop.
This programme's internationally acclaimed and comparative approach to the events, issues and debates of our times is particularly suited for those interested in exploring the bigger picture as well as the nitty-gritty of transformations in media and communications and their impact on culture, society and politics.
Its cutting-edge and interdisciplinary approach to postgraduate learning, independent study, and life skills provides you with the analytical skills, conceptual knowledge and practical understanding of the real and imagined shifts that are taking place in – and through – the media industries, everyday life online and on the ground at home and abroad.
The Masters attracts budding scholars, media practitioners, activists, and advocates from many regions, with a variety of educational and professional backgrounds.
It's particularly suitable for those wanting to move their knowledge and analytical skills up a level for further study as well as for those who have experience of studying or working in the media and cultural sectors, non-profits and other third sector organisations, alternative media, the arts, grassroots and international advocacy and activism.
The programme achieves these goals by:
The Programme Director is Professor Marianne Franklin. Lecturers, guest speakers, and research students on this programme are affiliated to the Centre for the Study of Global Media and Democracy, the School of Mass Communications at Texas Tech University (USA), the United Nations Internet Governance Forum, Edinburgh Law School, Le Monde diplomatique, a number of international NGOs, activist and advocacy groups, international academic and media networks.
The programme is broken into three parts:
The themes covered may vary from year to year, depending on research developments and staff availability.
Along with two compulsory (core) modules, research skills module, and a research dissertation, you can choose from a range of theory and practice option modules from Media & Communications as well as other Goldsmiths departments.
Distinguishing Features: this programme's content, structure, and assessment takes an interdisciplinary and innovative approach to:
Activities: Based on an interactive communication model of learning and teaching, the core programme is organised around lectures, participatory workshops, student presentations, written work, informed debates.
On completing this programme you will be able to (re)enter the workplace, return to your creative pursuits, activism, or advocacy project or, if you wish, continue onto further research with up-to-date knowledge about the facts and fictions around these trends.
Core modules
You also take:
Research Skills (60 credits)
As an integral part of successfully completing the Dissertation component, students take part in a two-term Research Skills module. Here we cover topics such as:
By term’s end students will be fine-tuning their individual research projects, contributing to our study of these themes in class presentations. Workshops and one to one supervision will provide further support for students until the end of the summer teaching term.
We offer a wide range of option modules each year.
Individual and group presentations; live video/web conferences, examined essays and research papers; qualitatively assessed assignments and discussion leading; dissertation.
Graduates from this programme find work and excel in a number of domains:
Alumni have found work with the BBC world service, Globo corporation, Carnegie Foundation, European parliament and European Commission, CCTV, NBC, Google, Microsoft, NGOs (eg Greenpeace, Global Partners) and charities (eg Dementia UK), newspapers (eg in South Korea, Brazil, Slovenia, China), alternative media and advocacy networks, museums, theatres and art gallerires, online national and international media outlets (eg Chinese, indigenous Taiwanese), PR and marketing around the world.
Other alumni have continued on to PhD programmes, at Goldsmiths and elsewhere. Many have been successful in gaining research scholarships and funding to further their academic and practitioner careers.
Early Childhood Studies at Roehampton is committed to babies and young children as people with agency and unique capacities, and to their overall wellbeing from the prenatal period.
The postgraduate programme draws on Froebel’s understanding of the transformative power of young children’s play on their thinking, and the crucial way that adults can either seek to assist or control young children’s intrinsic creativity. In adults’ interactions with children, however, Froebel recognised the profound influence of the community and social context.
The syllabus is underpinned by an awareness of the influence of these social, cultural and political contexts on young children’s lives, and of the roots and structures of inequality that arise from these issues. The programme will strengthen your awareness and understanding of these influences and explore how you take account of them in action. In these respects, the programme also draws inspiration from the work of Paulo Freire, the radical and pioneering educator.
The teaching is informed by active research and scholarship in early years policy and practice, as well as leading research into young children’s well-being, thinking and understanding. There is a deep commitment to working in partnership with families and communities and to the development of students’ professionalism, advocacy and leadership.
The programme is relevant, engaging and of professional and personal value for a variety of roles within the early years sector. For those working directly with young children, engagement with the course content will provide a platform for continuing professional development and career progression, while for those involved in early years policy or research, the course offers an opportunity to engage with up current thinking in a broad range of issues.
Students will first look at babies' and children’s capacity for play, how they think, and how they communicate their ideas and emotions though a variety of ‘languages’ such as talk, mark-making, drawing, construction, movement, music and dance. This is studied from a variety of theoretical perspectives, critically looking at the values and assumptions underpinning these views.
There is special focus on Froebel’s legacy in early childhood practice and other key pioneers in the child-centred tradition, which embodies advocacy and respect for children and their families. You will gain an understanding of the political nature of this work, learn advocacy skills for the well-being of young children and their families and develop effective leadership and collaboration techniques across disciplines in the field of early childhood. Alongside modules going deeper into young children’s emotions and well-being, students will learn skills for undertaking their own social and educational research. These skills will be put into practice with an extended in-depth research-based project, critically enquiring into an identified social or educational problem.
Modules
Compulsory modules
Required module
Optional modules
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