2022/23 course postponement
Please note, this course will not be running in 2022/23. For more information please contact our Admissions service on +44 (0)1225 876 180 or admissions@bathspa.ac.uk.
BA (Hons)
Undergraduate degree - combined honours
We accept a wide range of qualifications for entry to our undergraduate programmes. The main ones are listed under 'Typical offers' in the main column below. For combined courses, please check both subjects. If your qualification is not listed, please email admissions@bathspa.ac.uk with your specific details.
This secondary education degree is designed to enable you to gain real teaching experience before you embark on your PGCE. You'll study Education - in the broader contexts of professional practice, policy, teaching and learning - alongside the subject you're most passionate about.
In teaching, subject expertise and enthusiasm isn't enough to give you the edge. This degree gives you the practical experience of working in schools with young people that employers are looking for.
The course offers a guaranteed interview for our PGCE Secondary, and is flexible; we'll support you in achieving your aspirations as a professional educator - however they develop during the degree. You'll benefit from our tutors' wealth of research and practice-informed expertise when you join this community of learning and practice.
Throughout my three years on this course, I've developed a wide and in-depth understanding of the many ways that children learn. I feel confident in applying this understanding to my PGCE year and to my own teaching.
Robert Collard, graduate
You’ll explore education from many theoretical and ideological perspectives in your core modules. This in-depth knowledge of the education industry, combined with your specialist subject knowledge, gives you that all-important edge when you embark on your professional education career.
Year one
The first year introduces key concepts and skills that underpin the subject of Education Studies. In addition, the placement module provides you with a sound introduction to secondary schools via a school placement.
Year two
You’ll consider more deeply the current issues in education, such as pedagogy, pupil voice, special needs, assessment and classroom organisation. You’ll undertake a second school placement, this time with a focus on developing your professionalism.
Year three
This year, the Teaching and Professionalism module prepares you for the PGCE. For your dissertation, you'll explore an issue of your choice and use your creativity and the skills you've gained so far to develop a classroom resource to address it. You'll also have opportunities to engage with PGCE staff and students; this eases your transition to initial teacher training.
Coursework includes essays, group presentations, research-based reports and portfolio-based work. We’ll provide you with prompt feedback and give you regular guidance on how to improve your skills, knowledge and understanding.
All modules are led by experienced and respected university staff. Many staff are active researchers and authors in the field of education studies; from the outset, they’ll introduce you to their particular specialisms and research interests. You’ll also benefit from regular visiting speakers – these include headteachers, PGCE staff, practitioners, educational advisers, specialist researchers and international visitors.
This course offers or includes the following modules. The modules you take will depend on your pathway or course combination (if applicable) as well as any optional or open modules chosen. Please check the programme document (below the main image on this page) for more information.
An optional module which may include:
Please note, not all optional modules are guaranteed to run each year.
We have an excellent partnership with schools where you can develop your understanding of Secondary level teaching.
You’ll attend a placement in each year of the degree for approximately eight to ten days. They usually occur one day a week during a term to allow you to continue with other university studies. We’ll arrange each placement for you. We try to ensure you're located within a reasonable distance from where you live; however, you should normally expect to travel using your own or public transport.
You must be in possession of a Bath Spa DBS disclosure. Details are sent once you have accepted your place with us.
You’ll have the opportunity to study in a wide range of locations around the world. Our students have completed exchange programmes in a variety of countries including Spain, Sweden and the USA.
This course is designed to inform a range of education careers - from classroom teaching to advisory roles that inform policy and practice, both nationally and internationally.
Successful completion of the secondary education degree leads to a guaranteed interview for our Oftsted 'Outstanding' rated PGCE Secondary course.
Our students often enter the teaching profession in local schools and a range of other settings and benefit from continued participation in the community of research and practice here at Bath Spa.
This optional placement year provides you with the opportunity to identify, apply for and secure professional experience, normally comprising one to three placements over a minimum of nine months. Successful completion of this module will demonstrate your ability to secure and sustain graduate-level employment.
By completing the module, you'll be entitled to the addition of 'with Professional Placement Year' to your degree title.
Before your Professional Placement Year, you'll work to secure your placement, constructing a development plan with your module leader and your placement coordinator from our Careers and Employability team.
On your return to University for your final year, you'll submit your Placement Portfolio, detailing your development on your placement.
Our focus is on providing the best possible in-person experience for you and your peers whilst maintaining the most successful aspects of online delivery that we know will benefit your learning. Learn more by reading our programme delivery statement.
Your Secondary Education modules are based at Newton Park campus. You'll also undertake placements in schools in each year of your studies.
You'll benefit from access to a wide range of excellent facilities, including:
You'll have access to the PGCE team, particularly in your final year as you transition to initial teacher training, and you'll also benefit from talks by guest speakers and incoming experts. Access to our research centres will give you the opportunity to stay up-to-date with the latest in teaching research and excellence.
Please note: Students from the EU, EEA and Switzerland are not generally eligible for the UK (Home) fee status. Please refer to the international student rate. Irish citizens and those granted Settled status under the EU Settlement Scheme are eligible for UK (Home) fee status. There are also other circumstances where this may apply: See UKCISA for more information.
Year 1 | £9,250 |
Year 2 | Published Jan 2023 |
Year 3 | Published Jan 2024 |
Year 1 | Published Jan 2023 |
Year 2 | Published Jan 2024 |
Year 3 | Published Jan 2025 |
Year 1 | Published Jan 2024 |
Year 2 | Published Jan 2025 |
Year 3 | Published Jan 2026 |
Year 1 | £15,240 |
Year 2 | Published Jan 2023 |
Year 3 | Published Jan 2024 |
Year 1 | Published Jan 2023 |
Year 2 | Published Jan 2024 |
Year 3 | Published Jan 2025 |
Year 1 | Published Jan 2024 |
Year 2 | Published Jan 2025 |
Year 3 | Published Jan 2026 |
We’re looking for individuals who are curious, reflective and interested in their subject areas. You’ll be motivated, committed and keen to push the boundaries of your knowledge and get the best possible preparation for your future career.
We accept a wide range of qualifications for entry to our undergraduate programmes. The main ones are listed below. All applicants will also be required to hold GCSEs at Grade C/4 or above in English, Maths and Science.
English Language Requirements for International and EU Applicants
IELTS 6.0 - for visa nationals, with a minimum score of IELTS 5.5 in each element.
Entry requirements for PGCE courses
The entry requirements for subsequent interview to the PGCE programme may alter (for example if the DfE changes entry requirements for PGCE courses). You’ll be advised of any changes during the degree.
Course enquiries
For further information about the programme or entry requirements, please email us at admissions@bathspa.ac.uk.
This combined course will not be running in 2022/23. For more information please contact our Admissions service on +44 (0)1225 876 180 or admissions@bathspa.ac.uk.
Course leader: Eleanor West
Email: e.west@bathspa.ac.uk
Music is central to everything you do. You like playing it, making it, listening to it, and thinking about it. It is who you are.
The course draws on your passion for music and your inquisitiveness to open up ways that your interests and skills as a musician can be applied in different professional situations. In addition to developing your core skills as a creative musician, you'll explore how music can be used in education and community settings, for health and wellbeing, and as artistic practice, framed by experience of managing projects from an initial idea to its realisation.
The focus is on practical work, whether this involves devising music in an ensemble, putting on a public event, recording your own podcast series or developing a professional music service. We focus first and foremost on what you can do as a musician, guiding you to be entrepreneurial in all of the projects you undertake.
Throughout the course, you’ll gather evidence of what you can do as you build your career and talk to employers. You’ll also be given the creative space you need to make the kind of music you love.
Starting with your own interests as a musician, the course develops your core skills and gives you ways to apply them in practical employment contexts including education, community music, health and wellbeing, and arts management. The course focuses on developing your artistic practice as well as helping you learn new skills in areas such as:
Develop key professional skills and an impressive CV of evidence and experience that appeals to employers, preparing you for the music industry as it exists today.
Year one
Your first year focuses on developing and refining your core practical musicianship skills as a performer and/or composer. Through this practical work, you’ll learn about current music in relation to societal contexts, showing you the areas in which your practice can make a difference in people’s lives . Across the year, you’ll undertake a series of short projects that give you a chance to explore new aspects of music making and ways to share it with others, working in groups as well as on your own ideas.
Year two
Building on what you have learnt in the first year, we help you professionalise your work in relation to specific and applied industry contexts. You’ll collaborate with others and participate in external projects with our industry partners. As part of this work, you’ll be mentored to expand what you can do as a musician at a higher technical level and explore ways to work with people from other disciplines. You’ll also present your creative work in public events, including our annual University arts festival, Sparkfest.
Year three
In your final year, you’ll be supported in transitioning to work as an independent industry professional. You’ll design and deliver creative projects and events in areas including education, community music, health and wellbeing, and arts management. You’ll be able to focus on your individual career aspirations as a professional musician, and build the CV you need to get you there, supported by placement opportunities. We help you plan and manage projects, balancing creative and entrepreneurial decision-making, which lead to a large-scale final professional project in an area of your choice.
The core of the work you do is based around projects, working individually and collaboratively with others. You’ll work with our team of industry professionals, both within music and from other disciplines.
Teaching is practical and managed through a mix of workshops and rehearsals, seminars and lectures, alongside tutorial support. We provide regular sessions with visiting professionals which provide key industry insight.
All of our assessments are based in practical and applied music-making. In addition to the creative work you make through performances and compositions, you’ll create outputs such as high quality audio-visual documentation, podcasts, websites, teaching materials, project proposals and public events.
As a result, taken together, your assessment projects will form a portfolio. This portfolio can be used to evidence your skills to employers, as part of a showreel, or CV.
This optional placement year provides you with the opportunity to identify, apply for and secure professional experience, normally comprising one to three placements over a minimum of nine months. Successful completion of this module will demonstrate your ability to secure and sustain graduate-level employment.
By completing the module, you'll be entitled to the addition of 'with Professional Placement Year' to your degree title.
Before your Professional Placement Year, you'll work to secure your placement, constructing a development plan with your module leader and your placement coordinator from our Careers and Employability team.
On your return to University for your final year, you'll submit your Placement Portfolio, detailing your development on your placement.
Our focus is on providing the best possible in-person experience for you and your peers whilst maintaining the most successful aspects of online delivery that we know will benefit your learning. Learn more by reading our programme delivery statement.
The course is taught at our Newton Park campus, based in the Michael Tippett Centre, which houses a purpose-built concert hall, performance spaces, practice rooms, and recording studios.
Music students also have access to the campus’s wider arts facilities, including numerous electronic music studios, university theatre, and industry-spec TV studio.
Please note: Students from the EU, EEA and Switzerland are not generally eligible for the UK (Home) fee status. Please refer to the international student rate. Irish citizens and those granted Settled status under the EU Settlement Scheme are eligible for UK (Home) fee status. There are also other circumstances where this may apply: See UKCISA for more information.
Year 1 | £9,250 |
Year 2 | Published Jan 2023 |
Year 3 | Published Jan 2024 |
Year 1 | Published Jan 2023 |
Year 2 | Published Jan 2024 |
Year 3 | Published Jan 2025 |
Year 1 | Published Jan 2024 |
Year 2 | Published Jan 2025 |
Year 3 | Published Jan 2026 |
Year 1 | £15,240 |
Year 2 | Published Jan 2023 |
Year 3 | Published Jan 2024 |
Year 1 | Published Jan 2023 |
Year 2 | Published Jan 2024 |
Year 3 | Published Jan 2025 |
Year 1 | Published Jan 2024 |
Year 2 | Published Jan 2025 |
Year 3 | Published Jan 2026 |
We’re looking for individuals who are curious, reflective and interested in their subject areas. You’ll be motivated, committed and keen to push the boundaries of your knowledge and get the best possible preparation for your future career.
We accept a wide range of qualifications for entry to our undergraduate programmes. The main ones are listed below. All applicants will also be required to hold GCSEs at Grade C/4 or above in English, Maths and Science.
English Language Requirements for International and EU Applicants
IELTS 6.0 - for visa nationals, with a minimum score of IELTS 5.5 in each element.
Entry requirements for PGCE courses
The entry requirements for subsequent interview to the PGCE programme may alter (for example if the DfE changes entry requirements for PGCE courses). You’ll be advised of any changes during the degree.
Course enquiries
For further information about the programme or entry requirements, please email us at admissions@bathspa.ac.uk.
This combined course will not be running in 2022/23. For more information please contact our Admissions service on +44 (0)1225 876 180 or admissions@bathspa.ac.uk.
Website feedback to web@bathspa.ac.uk