Course summary

This course will provide you with high quality, broad-based training in animal related biological sciences. You'll study a mixture of practical, scientific, technical and business principles to prepare you for a career in animal management and give you a thorough understanding of the field. This course is based around a framework of units essential to animal management disciplines, ensuring that you will have a detailed understanding of animal management practices and processes, including the underlying principles of biological sciences. The underpinning ethos of the course will be provided by studying the concept of ethics and how we decide what is right and wrong, supported by the legislative framework. Additional units will broaden the scope of your understanding by situating animal management in the context of business, work and employment. Work-based learning is fundamental to this course, as it will bridge the skills, knowledge and attributes gained in the classroom and the working environment, and support your development of wider employment skills. Obtaining placements for work-based learning will help you to apply your learning and help you to demonstrate core competencies. You will need to undertake 100 hours of work-based learning for each of the two years (200 hours in total). A one-week field trip occurs during the first year of the course, which will help to contextualise your learning. Students have previously visited Holland with the trip costing around £350 (paid in instalments). On successful completion of this course you can progress on to a third year top-up course that we deliver, to achieve a BSc in Animal Management or Animal Science. You could also progress to employment in a relevant field: recent graduates have obtained employment at zoos and animal parks, in animal and medical research, in administration and in the teaching of animal related subjects. The brand new Shuttleworth Zoological centre is a first of its kind within the state education system to accommodate a biosphere. A wide variety of species of taxa from Avian, Amphibia, Reptilian and Mammalian are housed in naturalistic enclosures enhancing student experience.