Course summary

Study for the Human Sciences MSci at Birmingham and you’ll discover an interdisciplinary programme that combines topics including genetics, sociology, psychology, evolutionary biology, biochemistry, neurosciences and anthropology coupled with understanding the past and ongoing impact of the human race and the human condition on ecosystems and the planet. This 4-year MSci-level course builds on the framework of the 3-year BSc Human Sciences BSc course. It offers the same flexibility and allows you to tailor a programme of study that matches individual interests and goals. This course particularly emphasises practical training and research skills, as well as the development of transferable skills that can be deployed in a wide range of professional settings. The Masters year, which follows on from the three-year BSc programme creating a fourth year, is devoted to developing research competence through a multi-faceted teaching and research programme. You'll benefit from some of the country's best facilities and technology, being taught by experts in the field renowned the world over for their cutting-edge research. Why study this course?

• Innovative interdisciplinary teaching and learning. Human Sciences is an innovative programme that draws on teaching and research expertise from the four Schools that make up the College of Life and Environmental Sciences. As such the course brings a unique and rich interdisciplinary viewpoint to bear on the topics that you will study.

• Learn from multimodal research performed at different scales. The Schools that collectively deliver this course use very different research approaches reflecting their different disciplines. This programe will provide you with a unique insight to these different approaches, but also what fundamentally unites them and how they can be brought together to address major local and global challenges. You will spend time in individual research groups and laboratories across these different disciplines as well as learning about research exploring large scale multi-million-pound infrastructures.

• Outstanding employability opportunities. The needs for global action are changing the graduate employment market in real time. New roles are arising in companies from new start-ups to global corporations as well as in agencies (such as WHO, UNICEF, UN), in NGOs, forestry, agriculture, governments, law, education, research, journalism, and broadcasting. This programme has been designed in response to these growing employment needs and will equip you to be able to become one of the next generation of leaders, innovators, policy makers, teachers, and researchers at forefront of tackling global challenges.

• Opportunity for training in innovation and company start up. Perhaps you may feel that during your studies you have identified a gap in the market and have an idea for a start-up company of your own. An option in the final year is to take modules in learning entrepreneurial skills and entrepreneurial start-up.

• Glacial eco-systems field trip. One of the optional second years modules on offer is a field trip to Norway to study glacial ecosystems and how these are threatened by human global impacts.