Course summary

Understand what social policy and criminology teach us about our societies. Learn how these subjects individually provide insights into social problems and harms and when studied together, offer an exciting lens on the world around us. Our Social Policy and Criminology Joint Honours degree will offer you an exciting opportunity to examine issues which strike at the heart of many contemporary political and media debates. This Joint Honours course combines popular degree subjects that offer complementary insights into a range of social problems and social harms. You will be encouraged to consider the reasons why they are designated as being either 'crimes' or 'social policy' issues and therefore are dealt with through contrasting 'welfare' or 'criminal justice' responses. Students who meet the requisite academic performance criteria will be offered the opportunity to undertake a specialist placement during the second year of their degree programme. The Social Policy and Criminology Joint Honours is an interdisciplinary programme suitable for students who are currently studying a range of subjects at A-level and who have a particular interest in a wide range of topic areas, such as poverty, homelessness, crime, prisons, drugs and alcohol addiction. Your degree will follow the same programme as the standard degree in Years 1 and 2. However, your third year will be spent abroad at a university in the EU or elsewhere in the world. After completing your year abroad, you will return for your fourth and final year to the same degree programme.