Criminology and Criminal Justice
Wrexham University
UCAS Code: M240 | Bachelor of Arts (with Honours) - BA (Hons)
Wrexham University
UCAS Code: M240 | Bachelor of Arts (with Honours) - BA (Hons)
Entry requirements
A level
Accepted alongside A-Levels as part of overall 96-112 UCAS Tariff requirement.
Access to HE Diploma
96-112 UCAS Tariff points
96-112 UCAS Tariff points
Accepted as part of overall 96-112 UCAS Tariff requirement.
96-112 UCAS Tariff points from International Baccalaureate Certificates
96-112 UCAS Tariff points
Accepted alongside Irish Leaving Certificate Higher Level as part of overall 96-112 UCAS Tariff requirement. Where GCSE Maths, English and/or Science are required these must be at O4 or above.
Pearson BTEC Level 3 National Extended Diploma (first teaching from September 2016)
Scottish Advanced Higher
96-112 UCAS Tariff points
Scottish Higher
96-112 UCAS Tariff points
UCAS Tariff
Accepted as part of overall 96-112 UCAS Tariff point requirement.
About this course
Why choose this course?
Our criminology degree tackles a fascinating array of questions from why people commit crime and how it affects society, to historical landmarks in the justice system and high-profile cases which had a ground-breaking impact on the legal arena.
Students will:
- Study criminology from a range of perspectives including social, political and psychological, focusing on modern methods of policing, development of policy and the workings of magistrates and crown courts.
- Examine criminal law and the role and work of the agencies that make up a modern criminal justice system.
- Take part in site visits to various operational areas of the criminal justice system.
- Have a variety of voluntary work opportunities.
- Learn from a dedicated team of research-active lecturers with experience in the criminal justice system and who are research active in the areas of youth justice, prisons, homelessness, terrorism, and substance misuse.
- Regular input from visiting speakers such as judges, police, probation and youth justice staff.
- Leave ready to enter a wide range of sectors including youth justice, probation, prison, the police and voluntary organisations.
- *Study a course which is part of a subject area rated first in the UK for student satisfaction in the Sociology subject league tables, Complete University Guide 2023.
- *Study a course that has been rated as part of the CHA3 subject group Sociology ranked 1st in the UK for the teaching on my course and overall satisfaction in the National Student Survey 2022.
- *Study a course that has been ranked 1st in the UK as part of the Criminology subject league table for Teaching Quality and Student Experience in The Times and The Sunday Times Good University Guide 2023.
Key Course Features:
- Be part of an inclusive, inviting and supportive community which fosters learning and encourages you to reach your full potential.
- You will have the opportunity to become involved with the active Criminology Society and engage with fun, interactive events, guest talks, conferences and charitable fundraisers
- Learning and teaching approaches that are innovative, flexible and enhance the student experience through thought-provoking activities, structured classroom sessions and critical debates.
- Our unique optional module will give you insight and direct experience of professional criminal justice practice and aims to prepare you for working within professional contexts. The module is experientially based allowing you to undertake a work-based placement, along with teaching hours.
- We have good links with all criminal justice agencies and employers such as the police, probation, prisons, magistrates’ courts and the youth justice service.
- Interested applicants are encouraged to join our social media sites for up-to-date information on networking and key events. These are Facebook @CriminalJusticeGlyndwr, Twitter @CCJglyndwr and Instagram @pandccj
- As well as rankings listed earlier, our Criminology & Criminal Justice degree is also part of a subject area rated 1st in the UK for teaching & course satisfaction, and is rated 6th in the UK overall, in the Criminology subject league tables (The Guardian University Guide, 2023).
Modules
What you will study
YEAR 1 (LEVEL 4)
The first year of our criminology degree provides an introduction to practice matters relating to working in the community justice system and understanding and engaging with offending behaviour. The range of modules explored in year one provide knowledge and understanding of the causes of crime at a societal and individual level and explores the work of the agencies that make up the criminal justice system.
MODULES
Study Skills in Higher Education (core)
Introduction to Criminology and Criminal Justice (core)
Signal Crimes and Criminals (core)
Drugs, Alcohol and Crime (optional)
Crime, Society and Social Policy (optional)
Introduction to Forensic Psychology (optional)
Attachment and Crime (optional)
YEAR 2 (LEVEL 5)
The second-year is designed to build directly on the skills and knowledge acquired during year one. You will study criminal law and in traditional lecturers and field trips where possible e.g. to prison and court, you will learn about advanced issues in effective practice with particular types of offenders. Criminological and research theory is explored to begin the process of developing students’ abilities to think theoretically and critically about the practice of criminal justice.
MODULES
Research Methods (core)
Criminology (core)
Crime and Criminal Behaviour (core)
Social Difference and Inequality (core)
Work-based learning (optional)
Working in Custodial and Community Settings with people who have offended (optional)
Criminal Law and the Criminal Justice Process (optional)
YEAR 3 (LEVEL 6)
In the final year, modules develop your abilities to apply theoretical and critical perspectives to criminal justice processes and practice. Some degree of choice is also offered in relation to modules options. The socio-political nature of criminal justice policy-making is explored and a critical lens is brought to bear on the criminal justice system.
You may then choose to explore how guilt and innocence might be negotiated in police and courtroom, the contribution forensic psychology might make to understanding crime, youth justice or multi-agency criminal justice response to crime. Students will also complete their own research project (option to conduct primary or secondary data collection) which explores an area of interest to themselves under the supervision of one of the experienced criminology lecturers in the department.
MODULES
Research Project (core)
Control, Justice and Punishment (core)
Optional
Multi-Agency working to manage risk and dangerousness (optional)
Youth Justice (optional)
Terrorism (optional)
Policing Contemporary Communities (optional)
The information listed in this section is an overview of the academic content of the programme that will take the form of either core or option modules. Modules are designated as core or option in accordance with professional body requirements and internal academic framework review, so may be subject to change.
Assessment methods
Teaching & Assessment
There is a variety of assessment methods for this course, including essays, presentations, case studies and examinations. In Year 3 you will be required to do a research project on a topic of your interest.
Flexible, accessible and inclusive teaching methods are utilised across the degree programme. Students will attend face-to-face lectures three days a week. Students are encouraged to participate in site visits to operational areas of the criminal justice system, which in the past have included visits to a crown court and a prison.
Wrexham University is committed to supporting our students to maximise their academic potential.
We offer workshops and support sessions in areas such as academic writing, effective note-making and preparing for assignments. Students can book appointments with academic skills tutors dedicated to helping deal with the practicalities of university work. Our student support section has more information on the help available.
In terms of particular needs, the University’s Inclusion Services can provide appropriate guidance and support should any students require reasonable adjustments to be made because of a recognised prevailing disability, medical condition, or specific learning difference.
Tuition fees
Select where you currently live to see what you'll pay:
The Uni
Wrexham
School of Social and Life Sciences
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?
The stats below 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.
Sociology
Teaching and learning
Assessment and feedback
Resources and organisation
Student voice
Who studies this subject and how do they get on?
Most popular A-Levels studied (and grade achieved)
Social policy
Sorry, no information to show
This is usually because there were too few respondents in the data we receive to be able to provide results about the subject at this university.
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.
Sociology
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
We have quite a lot of sociology graduates, although numbers fell last year. But graduates still do pretty well. Most sociology graduates go straight into work when they complete their degrees, and a lot of graduates go into jobs in social professions such as recruitment, education, community and youth work, and housing. An important option for a sociology graduate is social work - and we're short of people willing to take this challenging but rewarding career. Sociology is a flexible degree and you can find graduates from the subject in pretty much every reasonable job — obviously, you don't find many doctors or engineers, but you do find them in finance, the media, healthcare, marketing and even IT. Sociology graduates taking further study often branch out into other qualifications, like teaching, law, psychology, HR and even maths, so don’t think a sociology degree restricts you to just one set of options.
Social policy
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
Just over 1,600 students graduated in social policy in 2015, which makes it one of the smaller social studies subjects. This is a popular subject at Masters level — 750 Masters in social policy were awarded last year - and so a lot of the more sought-after jobs in management and research tend to go to social policy graduates with postgraduate degrees. For those who leave university after their first degree, then jobs in social care (especially community and youth work) and education, the police, marketing and human resources and recruitment are popular — along with local government, although there are fewer of those jobs around than in the past. This degree is a bit less reliant on London for jobs than other similar subjects, so if you'd like to work outside the capital, it might be worth considering - although the jobs still tend to be in big cities.
What about your long term prospects?
Looking further ahead, below is a rough guide for what graduates went on to earn.
Sociology
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
£23k
£24k
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.
Social policy
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
£23k
£24k
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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This information comes from the National Student Survey, an annual student survey of final-year students. You can use this to see how satisfied students studying this subject area at this university, are (not the individual course).
This is the percentage of final-year students at this university who were "definitely" or "mostly" satisfied with their course. We've analysed this figure against other universities so you can see whether this is high, medium or low.
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This information is from the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA), for undergraduate students only.
You can use this to get an idea of who you might share a lecture with and how they progressed in this subject, here. It's also worth comparing typical A-level subjects and grades students achieved with the current course entry requirements; similarities or differences here could indicate how flexible (or not) a university might be.
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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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