About the programme

If you want a career that’s challenging, stimulating and rewarding, our Social Care with Counselling Studies degree is an excellent preparation for working in the fast-growing field of social care. The combination of caring and counselling skills you gain will help you effectively understand and address people’s needs.
This degree covers all aspects of social care, giving you knowledge that will be invaluable in the voluntary or private care sectors. You’ll learn how to correctly assess care needs and make provision for appropriate care – and what you learn about counselling will mean you can help people make positive choices or changes in their lives.
This qualification gives you a sound foundation for a wide range of careers. Some of these areas include working with families, youth work, community care roles and working in housing – and obviously, your counselling skills will be especially useful in these areas. As well as traditional public sector employers like the NHS, private sector companies and the charity sector also offer career opportunities. Alternatively, if you want to pursue a professional qualification in counselling, this course will provide an excellent introduction to further study.

Programme modules:

Level 1

• Skills for Learning: Social Care
• Caring in Context: Poverty, Exclusion and Care
• Supporting Children, Young People and Families
• Introduction to Counselling Psychology
• Interpersonal Skills 1
• Exploring Social Care Theory and Practice (option)
• Social Care With and Within Groups (option)
• Who Cares? The Social Care Mosaic (option)

Level 2

• Social Care Practice 1
• Research Skills for Social Care
• Contemporary Social Policy
• Interpersonal Skills 2
• Psychology of Mental Health
• Personal Lives, Identities and Social Care (option)
• Violence in Everyday Life (option)
• The Legal Contexts of Care (option)

Level 3

• Social Care Practice 2
• Research Project
• Advanced Issues in Counselling Theory
• Psychology of Relationships
• Crime and Justice (option)
• Education and Everyday Life (option)
• Bodies and Minds (option)
• Housing and Homelessness (option)

Learning materials

This programme is offered on a distance-learning basis allowing you to select your learning environment – be it at home, office or a public library. Learning materials are presented in the format of textbooks with specially written Study Guides containing interactive activities; feedback is provided to enable you to monitor your own progress.

Assessment and examinations

There are two opportunities each calendar year at which to take exams or submit final assessments. There is an expectation that students require this first year to "learn how to learn". This means that the degree award only draws on marks in level II and III for the final classification.
For Single and Major Pathways a Project module is compulsory at level III. This allows students the opportunity to put into practice what they have learnt on their programme.

Duration

Each module requires 200 study hours (approximately six months) but you can study more than one module at a time.

Award

BSc (Hons) Social Care with Counselling Studies on successful completion of the full programme. You can also study individual modules, or gain an Ordinary BA degree, a Diploma of Higher Education, a Certificate of Higher Education, a University Undergraduate Certificate or a University Undergraduate Associate Certificate depending on the number of modules completed