Course overview
Do you want a career in the police force? Are you interested in contemporary policing and law enforcement?
Our Professional Policing degree offers an exciting opportunity to develop the knowledge and understanding of the role that professional police officers undertake in the UK.
Since 2020, all new entrants to UK police forces are expected to hold or gain a degree level qualification. This pre-join Professional Policing degree is a professional academic knowledge-based degree, based on the national curriculum for the police constable role, licensed by the College of Policing.
This course is subject to validation. You can still apply for this course while it is being approved.
About this course
This specialist degree will give you the pre-join qualification you need to apply for a police officer role in England or Wales. It will provide you with a wide range of knowledge and understanding of theories that the College of Policing has identified as being advantageous for those aspiring to join UK police forces.
You will have the opportunity to study a range of subjects including operational policing, legislation connected to police work, diversity, response and community policing, criminal investigation and safeguarding.
Learning from lecturers with extensive experience working within the police, prisons and security services, you’ll develop your knowledge of the UK police force and gain an understanding of the policing profession.
Throughout your studies, you'll be encouraged to form professional links with police forces as a volunteer or in the role of a special constable in order to gain additional practical experience and further enhance your employability.
A Professional Policing programme is specifically designed as a pre-join qualification for the police force. In line with the College of Policing licensing of the programme, professional work placements are not offered as part of this course.
Why study with us?
- This specialist degree is a great starting point if you want to pursue a career in policing
- Learn from lecturers with experience of working within police forces and security services
- Enhance your employability through volunteering opportunities
- Benefit from our experience delivering police officer education in partnership with West Yorkshire Police
Modules
You will study a variety of modules across your programme of study. The module details given below are subject to change and are the latest example of the curriculum available on this course of study.
Year 1
Core modules (students are required to take):
- Policing Overview and Understanding the Police Constable Role
- Policing Communities
- Research Methods and Academic Skills
- Legislative Practice for Policing
- Criminology and Crime Prevention
- Criminal Justice
Year 2
Core modules (students are required to take):
- Criminal Investigation
- Police Accountability, Decision Making and Discretion
- Evidence-based Policing (EBP) and Problem-solving
- Information and Intelligence
- Victims and Witnesses
- Police Response, Critical and Major Incidents
Year 3
Core modules (students are required to take):
- Policing Mental Health, Vulnerability and Risk
- Serious and Organised Crime
- Policing Abuse and Public Protection
- National police promotion framework (NPPF) Promotion and National investigators' exam (NIE) Preparation
- Research Project
Learning and Teaching
At Leeds Trinity we aim to provide an excellent student experience and provide you with the tools and support to help you achieve your academic, personal and professional potential.
Our Learning, Teaching and Assessment Strategy delivers excellence by providing the framework for:
- high quality teaching
- an engaging and inclusive approach to learning, assessment and achievement
- a clear structure through which you progress in your academic studies, your personal development and towards professional-level employment or further study.
We have a strong reputation for developing student employability, supporting your development towards graduate employment, with relevant skills embedded throughout your programme of study.
We endeavour to develop curiosity, confidence, courage, ambition and aspiration in all students through the key themes in our Learning and Teaching Strategy:
- Student Involvement and Engagement
- Inclusion
- Integrated Programme and Assessment Experience
- Digital Literacy and Skills
- Employability and Enterprise
To help you achieve your potential we emphasise learning as a collaborative process, with a range of student-led and real-world activities. This approach ensures that you fully engage in shaping your own learning, developing your critical thinking and reflective skills so that you can identify your own strengths and weaknesses, and use the extensive learning support system we offer to shape your own development.
We believe the secret to great learning and teaching is simple: it is about creating an inclusive learning experience that allows all students to thrive through:
- Personalised support
- Expert lecturers
- Strong connections with employers
- An international outlook
- Understanding how to use tools and technology to support learning and development
Programme delivery
Your time on campus, learning through in-person teaching, is at the heart of your academic experience and the way we deliver our programmes. This is supported and further enhanced by additional engagement activities and opportunities provided online and through digital teaching materials. This blended approach seeks to ensure a positive learning and teaching student experience.
Your programme of study has been carefully designed around a three-phase model of delivery:
- Preparation: You will be given clear tasks to support you in preparing for live teaching. This could include watching a short-pre-recorded lecture, reading a paper or text chapter or preparing other material for use in class.
- Live: All your live teaching will be designed around active learning, providing you with valuable opportunities to build on preparation tasks, interact with staff and peers, and surface any misunderstandings.
- Post: Follow-up activities will include opportunities for you to check understanding, for staff to receive feedback from you and your peers to inform subsequent sessions, and for you to apply learning to new situations or context.
Preparation, Live and Post teaching and learning and the digital materials used will vary by course, but will be designed to help you structure your learning, take a full and active part in your course, and apply and test your developing knowledge and skills.
Assessment
A variety of assessment methods are used, matched to the learning outcomes for your programme, allowing you to apply and demonstrate the full range of knowledge and skills that you have developed.
For more details on specific assessment methods for this course contact hello@leedstrinity.ac.uk
Entry Requirements
Leeds Trinity University is committed to recruiting students with talent and potential and who we feel will benefit greatly from their academic and non-academic experiences here. We treat every application on its own merits; we value highly the experience you illustrate in your personal statement.
Information about the large range of qualifications we accept, including A-Levels, BTECs and T Levels, can be found on our entry requirements page. If you need additional advice or are taking qualifications that are not covered in the information supplied, please contact our Admissions Office.
| Qualification | Grade |
|---|---|
| UCAS tariff | 104-128 |
| GCSE requirements | GCSE English Language at grade C or 4 (or higher) |
Fees and finance
Funding
UK Home Students:
Tuition fees cost £9,250 a year for this course in 2023/2024.
Part-time tuition fees will be prorated accordingly to the number of credits you're studying.
Depending on government policy, tuition fees may change in future years.
Tuition fees for 2024/25 entry will be set in summer 2023.
Living costs, e.g. accommodation, travel, food, will also need to be taken into consideration.
Leeds Trinity offers a range of bursaries and scholarships to help support students while you study.
International Students, including EU Students:
Visit our webpage for international students.
Part-time study is not available for international students on a Student Route Visa.
Additional costs
We advise students that there may be additional course costs in addition to annual tuition fees:
- Recommended and required reading lists will be provided at the start of your course. All the books and e-books are available from our Library to borrow but you may choose to purchase your own.
- On some courses there may be additional costs, such as field trips, equipment, accreditations, that may be part-funded by the University. More details will be provided at the start of the course.
- You'll need to include placement/s travel and associated costs too, however the University will contribute a standard amount towards your total expenditure.
- The University provides students with a £6 printing credit each academic year which can be topped up either on campus or online.
How to apply
For full-time undergraduate courses, you apply through UCAS. That's the University and Colleges Admissions Service.
On your application form, you'll need to know our institution code - it's L24 - and the course code. If you click through to the UCAS website using the button below, it'll take you to the right place with all the information you need.
You'll need to write a personal statement - we've prepared a guide to help you.
If you require a Student Route Visa in order to study in the UK, then you must meet all the conditions of your offer and present all supporting documentation required for the visa application no later than Friday 28 July 2023.
Although the main UCAS deadline has passed for 2023 entry, you can still apply until 30 June if you haven’t applied yet or haven’t used all five choices on UCAS. After this date, all applications will go through Clearing.
Alternatively, if you’ve used all your five choices, but received no offers or declined your offers, you may be eligible to add another choice through UCAS Extra. UCAS will send you information on UCAS Extra if you’re eligible.
UCAS Extra opened on Thursday 23 February 2023 and closes on Tuesday 4 July 2023.
Applications are not yet open for courses starting in September 2024. You can register and start your application for 2024 from 16 May 2023, although you cannot submit it until later in the year. The UCAS application deadline for courses starting in September 2024 is 31 January 2024
There's lots more information about the application process on the UCAS website, or you can get in touch with our admissions team who will be happy to help:
- call 0113 283 7123 (Monday to Thursday, 9.00am to 5.00pm, or Friday 9.00am to 4.00pm)
- email admissions@leedstrinity.ac.uk
Graduate opportunities
Providing you with the opportunity to develop the professional skills and experience you need to launch your career is at the heart of everything we do at Leeds Trinity University.
This degree will prepare you for opportunities in the police service or for work in civilian policing roles, the broader criminal justice system or within the wider security services.
The Professional Policing BA (Hons) degree does not guarantee employment with the police service as an officer or staff member but provides you with the academic entry requirement via the pre-join degree route.
If you wish to use this degree as your entry route to the police service, you must apply to join a police force within five years of your graduation. Successful achievement of the degree does not guarantee recruitment as a probationary police constable. Each police force sets out its own entry requirements, recruitment process and selection policy.
After you graduate, Careers and Placements will help you as you pursue your chosen career through our mentoring scheme, support with CV and interview preparation and access to graduate employability events.
To find out how we can help you make your career ambitions a reality, visit:
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