Professional Policing (including a Foundation Year)
University of Chester
UCAS Code: L901 | Bachelor of Science (with Honours) - BSc (Hons)
University of Chester
UCAS Code: L901 | Bachelor of Science (with Honours) - BSc (Hons)
Entry requirements
72 UCAS points overall including grade D at GCE A level
Pass Access to HE Diploma
International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme
Leaving Certificate - Higher Level (Ireland) (first awarded in 2017)
Pearson BTEC Level 3 National Extended Diploma (first teaching from September 2016)
Scottish Higher
T Level
T Level with a Pass grade and D or E on the core
UCAS Tariff
About this course
This course is a national pre-join degree licensed by the Policing Professional Body, the College of Policing. The course is delivered by subject-matter experts and experienced practitioners (including retired police officers) with a wealth of subject expertise to prepare you with key transferable skills required for the role of Police Constable.
Getting into any of the 43 Police Forces in England and Wales has changed and is something to consider if you are thinking of pursuing a career as a Police Officer. Since 2020, you need a professional educational qualification to be confirmed in post, as a Police Constable.
On our course, you will cover all the learning content of the College of Policing’s Degree in Professional Policing, as well as receive additional detailed inputs on specialist subjects like Counter Terrorism and Digital Crime. You will gain a grounded knowledge of the key aspects of policing like legislation, police powers, and investigative interviewing skills.
Our excellent simulation facilities for role-play scenarios will allow you to put your knowledge into practice in a safe learning environment. Our Policing Skills Labs comprise an immersive learning suite, interview rooms, crime scene houses, road policing scenarios, a custody office, and a mock courtroom.
Through our relationships with police colleagues, we can help you obtain an opportunity to apply to be a special constable, allowing you to put your knowledge and skills into practice with on-the-job experience, and providing evidence to support your CV.
Foundation Year courses have been designed for students who do not have the necessary academic qualifications needed to enter directly into the first year of a degree but who have the ability and commitment to do so. Once the Foundation Year has been completed successfully, you can then go on to complete your degree.
Modules
This degree is designed to give you the skills and abilities you will need to progress in a career in policing and wider law enforcement.
You will study a wide range of modules that give you a thorough understanding of the key areas of policing with practical employability skills appropriate for a career in a Police force or wider law enforcement agencies such as the National Crime Agency.
The first year of study is designed to provide students with the knowledge and practical skills required to become a Special Constable if they so wish. Students will study criminal law and police powers and procedures. In addition they will gain invaluable knowledge in relation to intelligence, road traffic policing and response policing
The second year of the degree builds upon this knowledge studying evidence-based policing, criminology theory and community policing. There is also a practical-based module where students will investigate a crime from the initial report to giving evidence in court. This includes investigative interviewing, investigation skills, forensics and intelligence gathering and understanding.
In the third year of study, students will study digital policing and leadership skills together with undertaking an academic project in an area of policing or law enforcement that they are interested in or an area of policing in which they wish to pursue as a career. There is a final module where they will apply skills, abilities and experiences they have gained throughout the degree to investigate a complex criminal investigation.
The University is licensed by the College of Policing, the professional body of the police, to deliver the professional degree course which is one of the pathways into a police force. However, the skills and abilities you will gain provide a wide range of employment opportunities and potential in law enforcement and wider employment.
The information listed in this section is an overview of the academic content of the course that will take the form of either core or option modules and should be used as a guide. We review the content of our courses regularly, making changes where necessary to improve your experience and graduate prospects. If during a review process, course content is significantly changed, we will contact you to notify you of these changes if you receive an offer from us.
Assessment methods
This course is taught in three terms of ten weeks each.
Scheduled contact hours will be approximately 12 hours per week. Teaching takes place on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday.
This course is delivered with the majority being in-person learning, however, there may be elements of online learning. Students can expect to take part in lectures, workshops and peer-led seminars.
Students should expect to spend an average of 10-20 hours per week on independent study which might include following asynchronous learning material on the University’s VLE, tutorial time with staff, using the University’s library, working with peers and preparing work for assessment.
Teaching will be delivered by experienced academics and practitioners in the subject. This will be supplemented by occasional guest lecturers and speakers.
The assessment strategy for this course was developed in accordance with the requirements of the College of Policing to provide students with the necessary skills, abilities and experience to be an effective candidate for the Police.
Students will be assessed using a variety of methods, incorporating practical elements where applicable. Formative and summative assessments have been designed to authentically reflect professional policing through the production of material utilised within policing, thereby developing effective and robust transferable skills in graduates.
Some of the assessments include:
coursework in the form of essays
academic posters
presentation
witness /suspect interviews
investigative decision logs
conducting a stop/search
a road traffic collision
and giving evidence in a courtroom.
The assessment methods are continuously reviewed so that they reflect the requirements of the College of Policing. They are created so that the teaching on this course adequately prepares students for graduate-level employment.
Tuition fees
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What students say
We've crunched the numbers to see if the overall teaching satisfaction score here is high, medium or low compared to students studying this subject(s) at other universities.
How do students rate their degree experience?
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Law
Teaching and learning
Assessment and feedback
Resources and organisation
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Who studies this subject and how do they get on?
Most popular A-Levels studied (and grade achieved)
After graduation
The stats in this section relate to the general subject area/s at this university – not this specific course. We show this where there isn't enough data about the course, or where this is the most detailed info available to us.
Law
What are graduates doing after six months?
This is what graduates told us they were doing (and earning), shortly after completing their course. We've crunched the numbers to show you if these immediate prospects are high, medium or low, compared to those studying this subject/s at other universities.
Top job areas of graduates
Law graduates tend to go into the legal industry, and they usually take similar routes. Jobs are competitive — often very competitive - but starting salaries are good and high fliers can earn serious money - starting on over £24k in London on average. Be aware though - some careers, especially as barristers, can take a while to get into, and the industry is changing as the Internet, automation and economic change all have an effect, If you want to qualify to practise law, you need to take a professional qualification — many law graduates then go on to law school. If you want to go into work, then a lot of law graduates take trainee or paralegal roles and some do leave the law altogether, often for jobs in management, finance and the police force. A small proportion of law graduates also move into another field for further study. Management, accountancy and teaching are all popular for these career changers, so if you do take a law degree and decide it’s not for you, there are options.
What about your long term prospects?
Looking further ahead, below is a rough guide for what graduates went on to earn.
Law
The graph shows median earnings of graduates who achieved a degree in this subject area one, three and five years after graduating from here.
£19k
£22k
£25k
Note: this data only looks at employees (and not those who are self-employed or also studying) and covers a broad sample of graduates and the various paths they've taken, which might not always be a direct result of their degree.
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Post-six month graduation stats:
This is from the Destinations of Leavers from Higher Education Survey, based on responses from graduates who studied the same subject area here.
It offers a snapshot of what grads went on to do six months later, what they were earning on average, and whether they felt their degree helped them obtain a 'graduate role'. We calculate a mean rating to indicate if this is high, medium or low compared to other universities.
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Graduate field commentary:
The Higher Education Careers Services Unit have provided some further context for all graduates in this subject area, including details that numbers alone might not show
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The Longitudinal Educational Outcomes dataset combines HRMC earnings data with student records from the Higher Education Statistics Agency.
While there are lots of factors at play when it comes to your future earnings, use this as a rough timeline of what graduates in this subject area were earning on average one, three and five years later. Can you see a steady increase in salary, or did grads need some experience under their belt before seeing a nice bump up in their pay packet?
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