Bachelor of Science (Hons) in Conservation Biology (Optional Placement)

at University of Plymouth United Kingdom

Discover why art from the past still matters to our modern society in the city that spawned Joshua Reynolds, the first president of the Royal Society. Learn what art can teach us about the past and how it can help us shape a better future. Build links with art historians and archivists and prepare for a career in the art world through our connections with high profile, international institutions like the National Gallery and Tate Britain, and benefit from the contacts of our published academics.

Key Features

• Art throughout history. Art history at Plymouth enables you to explore our complex past and navigate visual culture. Let our immersive modules take you across the world, from the Renaissance period to the present, from 14th-century fresco painting in Italy to artistic responses to the atomic bomb.

Geography explores the relationships between people, places and the environment. Our diverse degree has a strong emphasis on applied skills and career development. You can choose to specialise or maintain a broad range of interests, and an optional placement year offers work experience. You learn from expert, accessible, supportive staff who are skilled researchers in their field. Plymouth is the ideal setting as a vibrant urban environment surrounded by iconic rural and coastal landscapes.

Our geography degrees make the most of geography’s strengths in tackling head on the biggest global challenges we face. Modules have been designed to address many of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals – developed by the UN as the 'blueprint to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all' – all of our degrees are fully accredited by the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG).

Key Features

• Our newly designed curriculum places sustainability challenges at the centre, with modules designed to help address the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
• Choose from a range of physical and/or human geography choice modules so that you determine your degree pathway.
• Our supportive staff are expert researchers and many are world leaders in their field.
• Teaching is innovative and student-centred. You will learn through lectures, seminars, practicals, national and international residential fieldwork, tutorials and one-to-one dissertation support.
• Learn to use Geographical Information Systems to analyse and communicate complex spatial data.
• Take the opportunity to spend your second year studying abroad in Europe, Canada, Australia, USA or elsewhere through our bilateral and ISEP exchange programmes.
• Study on a course designed with a focus on employability and applied geography, supporting a range of career opportunities such as environmental consultancy, conservation and biogeography, earth science and hazard management, expedition work, and catchment management.
• Experience a valuable work placement programme, opening up a range of career opportunities.
• LABplus is a unique open access laboratory and resource centre designed for students studying science and engineering courses. The lab provides a flexible workspace, computing facilities, specialist software, access to microscopes, microscope cameras and bespoke resources.
• Benefit from our unique location, in the heart of the historical city of Plymouth, bordered by Dartmoor National Park as well as the Tamar Valley and South Hams Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Devon and Cornwall have glorious beaches, coasts, rivers and estuaries.Choose from a range of human, physical and environmental geography modules – our stimulating programme of geographical studies includes theory and practical elements.

Equip yourself with the skills and capabilities required for a strategic role in HR on this full-time programme. Through lectures informed by active research and opportunities to gain important work related competencies, you will develop the necessary skills for contemporary HR management, in a business and organisational context.

Key Features

Experience research-informed education by exploring the scientific basis of human health, disease and therapeutics. You'll benefit from a rich and varied learning environment that highlights recent developments and examines how these inform clinical and diagnostic practice. Receive the input of internationally-recognised researchers and NHS staff and open up a range of employment opportunities in both industrial and public research laboratories.

You will stand out with a degree accredited by the Institute for Biomedical Science (IBMS) and benefit from an option to transfer to BSc (Hons) Applied Biomedical Science at the end of your second year, complete a yearlong NHS placement and work as a professional NHS Biomedical Scientist. You will enjoy our unique open access laboratory and resource centre designed for students studying science and engineering courses and have the opportunity to experience more with an optional placement year.

Key Features

• Stand out with a degree accredited by the Institute of Biomedical Science (IBMS).
• Delivered by the Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry and enhanced by links with healthcare professionals.
• Develop practical skills, critical thinking and professional competence.
• Taught components of the course are enriched by the varied research activities of staff within the school.
• LABplus is a unique open access laboratory and resource centre designed for students studying science and engineering courses. The lab provides a flexible workspace, computing facilities, specialist software, access to microscopes, microscope cameras and bespoke resources. 
• Experience more with an optional placement year.
• Gain a positive learning experience within a work setting that will support your studies and future employability – the school offers 12 work placements between Stage 2 and the final year of your programme.
• Ten research summer placements are available between the first and second year and 20 between the second and final year. These competitive placements are available for students who demonstrate excellent performance in their studies and allow students to gain valuable research experience within the Biomedical Research Group.

Explore the latest developments in the field and master the complex set of skills needed to embark on a career in accounting and finance. You will have the opportunity to experience accountancy in the real world while working within businesses, and graduate with credits towards your professional accountancy qualification with the ACCA, ICAEW or CIMA.

Key features

• Start your career from day one, our course is accredited by the major professional accountancy bodies and new students are enrolled as student members of the ACCA or ICAEW. Our course is designed so that students are eligible for significant exam exemptions from the ACCA, ICAEW and CIMA on graduation.
• Careers advice is embedded throughout. Meet potential future employers at accountancy-specific careers events and explore where your career might take you. Join the Devon Chamber ROOTS scheme and receive training and professional mentoring, as well as invitations to top networking events.
• You will develop proficiency in key skills such as reflection, evaluation and group work. These skills will improve your academic performance, develop your ability to communicate, enhance your employment prospects and equip you for lifelong learning.
• The embedded use of spreadsheet software throughout the course allows you to gain important employability skills so that you can demonstrate your value to businesses immediately.
• Learn about global stock markets in our Bloomberg Interactive Learning Suite. Complete an optional online Bloomberg course awarded by the Bloomberg Institute allowing students to add this onto their CV and be provided with a certificate of completion.

Want to make a rewarding and positive contribution to society? Social workers support children and families through child protection procedures, fostering and adoption and youth justice to name but a few. They also support adults with issues including disability, drug and alcohol dependency, mental health, homelessness and safeguarding. You'll spend over 170 days on real-life placements with adults and children so you graduate ready to start your professional career.

You will get a head start – be eligible to apply to become a registered social worker as soon as you successfully complete the course. You will stand out from the crowd with a degree recognised by Social Work England. You'll gather insights and develop a real understanding of social work through our highly commended approach to integrated learning. you will equip yourself with the skills to be a reflective and ethical practitioner, committed to lifelong learning.

Key Features

• Get a head start – on successful completion of the course you can apply to become a registered social worker.
• Stand out from the crowd with a degree recognised by Social Work England.
• Benefit from the expertise of our network of partner agencies across the social work spectrum, learning from professionals to develop your skills.
• Enhance your career options - six months after finishing the course, 95 per cent of our graduates are in work or further study (source: 2019 DLHE survey results available on Discover Uni*).
• Gather insights and develop a real understanding of social work through our highly commended approach to integrated learning.
• Build your hands-on knowledge and experience on an excellent variety of placements, working in real-life adult and childcare settings in all three years.
• Engage with real service users and carers at every stage of your learning, so you graduate primed to put effective strategies to use in the workplace.
• Learn about the increasing influence of global issues on social work and be inspired by staff who are leading the way in international social work.
• Develop as a professional – equip yourself with the skills to be a reflective and ethical practitioner, committed to lifelong learning.
• To complement your formal learning we offer regular PALS sessions that provide the opportunity for you to learn with and from your peers. Share knowledge, discuss ideas, and ask questions in a relaxed and friendly environment. Find out more about the Peer Assisted Learning Scheme (PALS).

Acquire a deep insight into modern theories of nature using powerful mathematical techniques. This degree will provide you with the necessary mathematical language to be able to describe, analyse and predict natural phenomena. Final year modules include classical and quantum mechanics, electrodynamics and relativity, fluid dynamics and partial differential equations. A particular highlight of the degree is the choice of project modules to explore aspects of modern physics in depth.

Key Features

• Study the foundation of modern theoretical physics in modules such as Classical and Quantum Mechanics, and Electrodynamics and Relativity.
• Learn from world-leading researchers in theoretical physics, who will show you how the mathematics you study underpins and connects directly to modern research topics at the frontiers of physics; your first year course in linear algebra, for example, is taught by a collaborator of a 2018 Nobel Prize winner.
• Carry out an in-depth final year project in theoretical physics on topics such as quantum computers, black holes, teleportation or the quark model, supervised by a leading academic: our theoretical physicists have research connections across the globe, including at CERN and the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory.    
• Learn high-level programming skills and master industry software including Python, R and parallel programming on a supercomputer.
• Increase your employability with an optional, paid, industry placement between the second and final years.
• Progress, like our previous graduates, into careers in research, work in the Met Office, GCHQ, finance, industry and medicine or postgraduate degrees in applied mathematics and theoretical physics.

Interested in how people think, act and interact? Discover how thoughts, feelings and motivations shape our behaviour. A hands-on approach to learning across social, developmental, clinical, cognitive psychology and neuroscience will provide you the skills relevant across a range of careers, from education and health to business and the media. Shape the psychology graduate you want to be, and carve out your future in anything from professional psychology to marketing and management.

Key Features

• Hands-on learning in our psychology experiential learning lab. We embedded practical activities throughout the course, so you can put new knowledge into practice and build practical skills for future careers. 
• Shape the psychologist you want to be. Course choices and our option-based final year give the freedom to explore the areas of psychology that interest and benefit you the most.
• As a successful graduate, you are eligible for Graduate Basis for Chartered Membership with the British Psychological Society.
• Gain valuable real-world experience by putting your skills and knowledge into practice with an optional placement year, or take part in an international exchange year by studying abroad.

Are you a future tourism and hospitality industry leader? With a strong managerial focus, this programme will furnish you with a combination of tourism and hospitality theory, operational skills and practical methods of analysis. Take the opportunity to study the related areas of tourism and hospitality within a single programme to ensure you have the tools to become a confident and high executive-level manager in the international tourism and hospitality sector.

Key Features

90% of world trade is carried by sea, with a navigation and maritime science degree you can become a professional in this exciting and vital industry. Our graduates go on to careers in the shore-based maritime sector and, for those who follow the accredited route, to become a Ships Officer. Our degrees are accredited by the Maritime & Coastguard Agency and the Merchant Navy Training Board. You will study an exciting programme that develops the skills sought by employers across the sector.

You can increase your employability with an optional one-year industrial placement in a relevant maritime business or, if sponsored, work at sea towards the professional qualification of Officer of the Watch. We embed our full mission bridge simulator and sailing vessel in the teaching of this challenging applied degree. By studying with us, you will develop the skills required to join the next generation of leaders in the maritime sector.

Key Features

• Lay strong foundations for your successful career in the maritime sector. Our students go on to work in a diverse range of maritime industries. Whether you aspire to be a professional navigator, a marine manager or yacht racer, the world’s oceans could literally unfold before your eyes. 
• Distinguish yourself with a degree that’s accredited by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency, as well as the Merchant Navy Training Board*.
• Immerse yourself in the latest technology; we've equipped our Marine Navigation Centre with an advanced full mission ship simulator and the latest in electronic charts.
• Develop your 'sea-sense' with hands-on experience on our dedicated 13 metre sail and navigation training vessel 'Take The Helm' on Plymouth Sound. If qualified and approved, you'll be able to skipper the vessel yourself.
• Ensure you have the practical, communication and problem-solving skills employers are looking for. With a mixture of lectures, tutorials, and practicals featuring group and individual problem-based learning.
• Many of our students gain sponsorship from shipping companies or training providers. In many cases sponsorship becomes available to students already on our programme.  
• Students may also receive funding towards tuition fees and living expenses from the sponsoring company, greatly reducing costs. They go to sea as trainee officers to gain practical experience from a seagoing placement year.