Introducing Academic Skills

Constructive oral and written communication, and the effective and ethical management and presentation of knowledge and information, are essential for both academic work at degree level and your professional practice. This unit will enable you to develop your understanding of the skills and conventions of academic study in higher education and within your discipline, and recognise their transferability to and relevance for your work with service users and professional colleagues. You will be encouraged to identify your own academic strengths, areas for development, and strategies to support your academic growth.

By the end of the unit the students will have gained an understanding of key academic skills such as assessment planning, how to effectively use BREO, searching for and sourcing academic material, learning to reference and how to construct essays, presentations and consideration of the differences between academic work and professional report writing.

Development In Childhood And Youth

This unit will provide you with a solid understanding of human development to inform assessment, planning and intervention with children, young people and their families. You will gain theoretical knowledge to inform your professional practice. The unit will also help you to develop an awareness of aspects of difference that may affect human development including, gender, culture, race, society, disability disadvantage and environment. The assignment for this unit will enable you to develop your observational skills.

Relationship Based Practice

This unit aims to provide you with an introduction to a range of theories, methods and skills used in professional practice. Theory helps to predict, explain and assess situations and behaviour and provides a rationale for intervention.  Methods are specific techniques and approaches which professional workers use in practice. 

The key themes which this unit will focus on are how do professionals recognise human need and how should they respond to meeting identified needs.  Taught theory will enhance your capacity for effective communication and the development of relationship based practice with individuals and in groups to improve service-user outcomes. Within this, the concept of congruence will be explored – do we see ourselves as others see us?  Are our interventions received as they are intended? The models and underpinning theories will be put into practice in the classroom which will prepare you for the realities of practice. The unit will require you to engage in activities with each other which will bring the theory to life and give meaning to the various models of communication.  

Introduction To Research And Social Enquiry

The unit will prepare you for degree level study by promoting your understanding of how and why we carry out research in the social sciences. The unit seeks to introduce you to some of the methodological debates and social theories which inform and underpin social investigation and to link those debates to different approaches in social research. You will consider topics such as ‘the nature of society’, its essential characteristics, and on that basis how best to go about investigating social life. Firstly, we will consider the issue of social investigation and science Secondly, we will examine specific areas of social life, such as crime/education/immigration/health status- in order to illustrate how answers to the questions raised in part one will tend to shape approaches to social research. We will also discuss relevant research procedures, in particular those associated with "positivism" and with "anti-positivism" or ethnography.  We will introduce alternative views - those of critical theory and post-modernism - which have a bearing on social enquiry. Thirdly you will gain an understanding of quantitative and qualitative research procedures and their methodological implications.

Whilst studying the above topics you will be developing your academic writing skills, learning how to construct your written work and learn how to source and correctly reference relevant research/academic material such as; journal articles, policy papers, official statistics and books. This will be excellent preparatory work for all your assessments and especially the level 5 Research Approaches unit.

The assessment strategies are designed to help you to develop the academic skills required of higher education and to further develop your understanding of what it means to ‘study society’.

Career Planning For Social Scientists

This unit recognises the investment made by SASS students in coming to university to study a degree and is designed to begin the conversation about possible graduate destinations. It will also provide a lens through which the opportunities within your degree can contribute to your aspiration and the achievement of your graduate goal and by embedding Personal Development Planning as integral  to your future success

Within a student’s career journey, it is important to undertake activities that allow for the understanding of personal values, strengths, and developing a realistic vocational or employment self-concept. This unit will introduce these frameworks and enable you to consider your career planning in an informative and structured approach as you continue through your studies by recognising and most importantly, valuing, your lived experience. 

This unit aims to:

·       To give  students an opportunity to begin plotting their personal development journey over their three year degree course 

·       Provide career development  interventions to assist students’ ability to identify their transferrable skills and articulate their experience, skills and attributes in a confident, meaningful and positive manner.

Narratives Of Childhood And Youth

This unit examines children and young people’s lives through historical, sociological and philosophical perspectives. It explores the ways in which children and young people’s social and learning worlds are experienced by them and constructed, surveyed and regulated by adults. It draws on different theoretical perspectives to investigate notions of childhood through to adulthood, interrogating the subjective realities of their lives and learning across different spaces, places of family, community and school. It explores how social, economic, technological and cultural change, alongside difference, diversity and inclusion shape various narratives around contemporary childhood and adolescent experiences and raises critical questions for policy and practice about their care, equality, welfare and education. 

The unit is relevant to students who intend to work with children, young people and families, both in formal and informal education settings. It provides a broad understanding of the theories underpinning the studies of childhood, youth and education that is relevant to professional practice across family, school and community contexts. Completion of this unit will provide foundational knowledge that leads into Level 5 unit ASS032-2 Perceptions and Discourses of Childhood.

Identity Inequality And Difference

This unit aims to provide students with a critical understanding of structures and conceptualisations of identity, inequality, ‘race', and difference and their role and impact on societies over time. In terms of its relevance, the unit grounds students with an understanding of the important role of ‘race’, identity, inequality, ethnicity and difference in contemporary UK society and in an increasingly multicultural and globalised world and its implications for practice both in the UK and internationally. It also provides students the opportunity to critically reflect on and apply their acquired learning to both personal and professional contexts and to their engagement with other units within the social sciences. 

Disability In Society

The unit aims to introduce students to the study of disability from sociological and psychological perspectives. These sociological and psychological perspectives, with other understandings of disability, will be examined to equip students with an understanding and knowledge of how these frame social policy, education, employment, and social care provision. The unit will expose students to issues faced by disabled children, young people, and adults in a global society. This will involve examining how impairment/ disability is interconnected with other variables such as age, gender, ethnicity, class, stigma, social exclusion, social movements, and globalisation. The contributions of disabled people in society are important, and so students will have the opportunity to read and explore materials that are practical and political in addition to the academic literature. Students will engage in cultural and cross-cultural comparisons in the context of disabled people in the Global South.

Gangs And Serious Youth Violence

This unit examines and critically evaluates research evidence and sociological and criminological theory to explore the nature, extent and impact of gang offending and serious youth violence and how we might respond effectively to it. In doing so, the unit examines the historical, social, economic, political and cultural forces that have shaped both violent group offending and gang proliferation in the UK and elsewhere and considers the evidence base of current practice to address questions of policy, strategy and intervention.  

The unit will provide students with the opportunity to analyse the implications and complexities of researching ‘gangs’ and serious youth violence. It also equips students with the conceptual tools and knowledge base to critically assess policy and practice in relation to youth offending, particularly amongst culturally, economically, socially and politically marginalised young people and will enable students to link the study of youth group violence to broader themes explored in the core units.  

Mental Health And Society

This unit will introduce students to the main sociological and psychiatric perspectives on mental health and illness.  The role of the mental health professions and the changing role of psychiatry will be studied. Students will also study the social patterning of mental health and illness, and consider variations according to age, gender, social class and ethnicity.  Attention will also be paid to those experiencing mental illness, and the role and influence of representative user groups. The unit aims to show how our knowledge and understanding of mental illness have changed over time, as well as indicate the problematic nature of the definition of mental illness.
Attention will also be paid to the experiences of sufferers of mental illness, and the influence of user groups on mental health policy and legislation will be critically analysed. The unit will also focus on treatment and recovery and mental illness and differing social groups, for example, people with a serious mental illness, young people, prisoners, and people with a dual diagnosis.

The Social Sciences At Work

The graduate job market is a highly competitive arena. As such, it is essential for students preparing for graduate employment to have a realistic awareness of, the ways in which the professional work place operates and the skills, knowledge and experiences that are expected and desirable for their passport and successful transition into graduate level employment. This unit builds upon the Level 4 unit which requires students to have begun their thinking about their intended graduate destination and undertaken a level of career development planning at the end of their first year. 

During this unit, students will undertake work based opportunities with an organisation or service that is appropriate to their degree subject.  The expected length of time for this placement is a minimum of 15 hours.

Students will engage with personal development planning, to reflect on their own development as a professional and to gain insight into the breadth and complexity of graduate professional roles. They will be encouraged to complete the Bedfordshire for Success award as they progress through the unit by engaging with the Careers and Employability Service in the development of their individual career readiness.

Addictions And Society

The unit is designed to provide you with an introduction to a range of (co)addictive behaviours, such as gambling, gaming, substance misuse, sex and pornography, food, medicines and pharmaceuticals, relationships, consumerism, among many other, analysing the similarities and the differences between them. Additionally, it will provide you with a foundation knowledge of a range of theoretical perspectives on addiction and addiction language. It aims to develop a contextual understanding of addictive behaviours, within a political, social, cultural and historical framework, crucial when engaging with service users and the human services in contemporary society.

Research 1: Collecting Data

The unit will equip you with the key skills to be an independent researcher in the social sciences. You will develop an understanding of qualitative and quantitative data, different methods of collecting data and sources of collected data. This unit builds on the Level 4 Introduction to Research and Social Inquiry, which introduced some methodological debates and social theories, which inform and underpin social investigation.

You will learn about the different methods of collecting data and the importance of choosing a suitable method for data collection in social research. These aspects will be covered during lectures and workshops where you will have the opportunity to practice this knowledge.

The skills you will acquire from this unit are transferable and will be a useful asset to have for another Level 5 research unit, Research: Exploring data.

This unit will prepare you for the final year independent project unit at Level 6 as it allows you to familiarise yourself with the different methods for collecting data using both qualitative and quantitative research approaches.

Research 2: Exploring Data

The unit will equip you with the key research skills for social scientists relating to data interpretation and analysis. You will learn about different ways of exploring and analysing both quantitative and qualitative data during the lectures and gain practical experience of carrying out data analysis during the workshops.

  Building on the level four unit ‘Introduction to Research and Social Inquiry’, you will also enhance your knowledge and understanding of the entire process of a research project and individual steps involved in conducting research. You will be encouraged to consider why and how we analyse data and how the stage of data analysis fits within the whole research process. This unit is designed also to help you understand the use of theory in research and gives the opportunity to be involved in the exercise of identifying appropriate theories that can be utilised when creating your own research project.

This unit will prepare you for the final year project unit at level six. You will have developed the skills and knowledge required for you to confidently take forward your research idea, develop your proposal, carry out your chosen research methodology and create a worthwhile, structured and academically sound final year project.

Working Together: Multi-Agency Approaches To Risk And Assessment In Child Welfare

Current legislation and policy prioritise joined up working and partnership practice in relation to child welfare and safeguarding. This unit considers the historical roots of approaches to both child welfare and multi-agency working alongside current and emerging initiatives. It also explores how interdisciplinary approaches operate in the context of child welfare assessment and intervention and identifies the concepts, reasoning and purpose behind these.

The unit fosters students’ critical appreciation of the legislative, policy and operational environment of the range of services relating to child welfare, in order to develop their professional employability. 

Digital Childhoods

In the forward of the new statutory Relationship and Sex Education (RSE) guidance (DfE, 2019) Damian Hinds the then Education minister states: “Today’s children and young people are growing up in an increasingly complex world and living their lives seamlessly on and offline. This presents many positive and exciting opportunities, but also challenges and risks.” Whilst this opening may lead the unsuspecting reader to expect a balanced investigation of life online, unfortunately, in the pages that follow, the guidance does not mention any of these ‘exciting opportunities’ – and instead focuses on highlighting only the risks.

In this unit we will explore the discourse of risk and online harms against the argument for digital citizenship. As we manage the messages of protection and censorship verse empowerment and democratisation of knowledge and creativity.

We will explore young people’s rights online and how social media has provided children and young people a voice and allowed them to lead campaigns for their future.   

Indeed, for the first time in history digital blogs, youtube, and Tik-tock have provided young people with a platform to record their own stories and histories. This is something that has been lacking throughout history, with notable exceptions such as Ann Frank’s diary, never before have young people been able to record freely their own accounts of their experiences and detail the everyday uniqueness of their lives. 

Perceptions And Discourses Of Childhood

Children and young people’s development will be highlighted, exploring current and continued theory and perceptions with regards to physical, cognitive and identity formation and how children and young people perceive themselves and others.

The unit reflects the changing landscape of child development aligned with children rights an the discussions that take place in shaping the laws, policies and frameworks that form an essential aspect of the lives of children and young people.  

Children’s lives (globally and nationally, regionally) are becoming more into sharp focus and the need for students to be aware of the changing landscape of how policies are influenced and in turn influence the perceptions and discourses concerning children’s rights in the context of their development. 

Child Protection And Safeguarding: The Contexts Of Vulnerability

Those involved in devising and delivering child protection and safeguarding services in England and Wales over recent decades will have observed a gradual but inexorable increase in the scope, complexity and sophistication of the child protection system and of the associated legislation and guidance. The subject carries strong public emotions and professional responsibilities and therefore it remains vital that students maintain the basis of effective safeguarding while embracing new approaches to advancing professional practice to work.  

Child Safeguarding is an evolving discipline.  As society moves forward, we become aware of developing a reflexive approach to the changing contexts of lives of children, young people, and their families. A current approach developed here at the University of Bedfordshire by Dr Carlene Firmin is “Contextual Safeguarding”. This, alongside more traditional narratives for applied practice, is an emerging approach that addresses current issues such as County Lines exploitation. 

Contact with child abuse and neglect involves high levels of risk for children, their families, those who work with the children and their employing agencies. Set against a background of rapid and often radical changes in policy and practice, of complex inter-agency relationships and of enormous personal and professional demands, this unit offers a basic grounding in the most important issues involved. 

The aim of the unit is to provide you with an informative and practical introduction to those issues which are most important to the development of safe and effective policy and practice in relation to child abuse.  You will: 

Ø  Develop an enhanced knowledge of significant developments in child protection policy and initiatives. 

Ø  Explore and discuss past, current and emerging  methods and approaches in child protection practice and the implications for service provision. 

Ø  Develop skills and ability to critically analyse policy, practice, and research in the field of child protection/safeguarding. 

Ø   

Develop on the fundamental knowledge, attitudes and skills required in the demanding and complex field of child abuse and neglect.   

Childhoods In A Global Context

As practitioners we work with children and families from a range of social, cultural and ethnic backgrounds. This unit will encourage you to critically reflect on the nature of experience and practice in the UK and internationally with a view to improving services for vulnerable children, young people and families. You will be introduced to a framework of Global Childhoods, locating aspects such as care, education, health, support and well-being  as constructed within particular social, political, economic and cultural contexts, and consider the different theoretical models and approaches through which this diversity can be examined.  The unit teaching will make clear links with underpinning research and theoretical knowledge, to the study of childhoods, through international research, policy and practice.  

This unit will encourage you to investigate and analyse a range of approaches, and reflect on the relevance and significance of these for your own future practice in the UK and/or internationally. Throughout the unit you will be actively encouraged to examine  diversity and inequalities in childhoods. You will also be encouraged to reflect on your own experience and knowledge of childhoods in connection with the global and local childhoods you have explored. 

Special Educational Needs And Challenging Behaviour In Schooling

This unit provides the opportunity to explore the complex dynamics which are played out in the schooling system in the UK in relation to special educational needs and challenging behaviour. After attending this unit students will be have the confidence to work in SEN settings and will have a range of frameworks upon which to draw.

Within the 0-19 age range we will explore the wide range of contexts and situations which are experienced by children and young people on the margins of society. The ways in which these experiences shape a pupil’s educational experience will be considered with a view to the complex interactions between structural constraints and individual circumstance and the tensions this creates.

The Lived Experiences Of Children And Young People In Diverse Family And Social Circumstances

This unit provides the opportunity to explore the lives of young people who may be marginalised by their family and social circumstances. The focus is on their own lived experiences and realities.

It will consider a wide range of situations and the ways in which these are experienced and negotiated by young people offering a challenge to deterministic approaches. This will encourage students to develop an empathic response to young people and an ability to support and advocate with and for them. The unit is epistemologically grounded considering how we research, understand and intervene in young people’s lives and how this is informed by our approaches to children’s rights and agency. The unit will draw on recent research with a focus on participatory research methods and on participatory practice.

The unit provides a progression to L6 following L4 Narratives of childhood and L5 Perceptions and Discourses. This also provides a coherent theoretical framework on which to successfully complete the Independent Project.

Youth Justice: Models And Approaches

The Unit seeks to compare a wide range of practice and policies, primarily from the United Kingdom, Europe and North America, to examine which approaches to youth justice best meet the needs of young people and wider society through a best practice approach. 

The Unit will start by focusing upon the establishment of a separate youth justice system in the early 1900s to the present day, and will identify the political ideologies and criminal justice and social policies which have shaped the contemporary youth justice system within England and Wales. Within this framework, you will analyse the relationship between the changing knowledge base of youth justice and the ebb and flow of political and professional power. You will consider the impact of these developments on the evolution of professional practice within youth justice and, in particular, the factors which led to the reforms of the youth justice system in the late 1990s and subsequent developments. The Unit will introduce you to the legal and administrative framework of the contemporary youth justice system, the mechanisms for delivery of youth justice services and current debates surrounding policy and practice. Having established the basis of practice within the United Kingdom, the Unit will provide you with knowledge of alternative and complementary youth justice practice from a range of settings from both the developed and developing worlds which will enable you to engage with postcolonial and post disciplinary critiques of Western perspectives of youth and youth offending and perceptions of justice.   

The Unit will be of particular interest to you if you have experience of, or an interest in, youth justice, probation, crime prevention, policing, education and youth work.

Sass Change Maker Project Dissertation

This capstone experience provides students with an opportunity to join a community-based organisation and deliver a project that will encourage students to be reflexive about their role in social worlds relevant to their discipline.  They will develop skills through relevant partner training as well as project management, research and presentation skills which will make a positive impact to service users or the organisation/community more widely. In particular, the intention will be to create change and address inequality by responding to identified needs and promoting social justice.

By undertaking this unit you will have an opportunity to negotiate, plan, execute and evaluate your work, whilst monitoring your personal development against an agreed Personal Development Plan (PDP) in order to hone your employability skills. 

In order to complete this unit successfully, students will need to have presented a Project Proposal which receives approval as assessment 1 before the project is undertaken. Alongside this, the Student-Sponsor Agreement (including the agreed final method of assessment and evidencing a clear risk mitigation strategy) and the Personal Development plan are required at the end of the first 6 weeks. 

Sass Change Maker Research Dissertation

The aim of the unit is to consolidate and apply the knowledge gained from the previous years by demonstrating the ability to make sense of potentially complex and possibly contradictory findings and apply them to an area or issue related to your subject discipline. The Research Dissertation will allow you to examine contemporary social contexts and issues by applying subject-specific knowledge, theory and appropriate methodologies to the analysis of your chosen topic and consider how your work can contribute to the promotion of social justice. This requires the capability to inquire into complex issues systematically and critically and thus allows you to move from critical acceptance of knowledge to the critical constructor of that very knowledge and its broader application in society.

The Research Dissertation gives you an opportunity to develop a research proposal, consider the ethical implications of your project and to undertake an in-depth focused research enquiry relevant to your course and to your individual personal and professional interests and career intentions. It will take the form of either of the following: 

·       Primary research

·       Substantive literature review

·       Desktop research - secondary analysis project that addresses a proposition you wish to analyse in-depth

·       Content Analysis of policy documents, print media, social media, TV and/or film 

·       A Discourse Analysis 

The unit is additionally designed in part fulfilment of the University’s requirements for all award courses to provide opportunities for you to develop your personal development planning skills and evidence your abilities in independent learning. The predominant aim is to offer you the opportunity to demonstrate your ability to complete a sustained piece of individual research on an appropriate topic in ways that also enhance your personal and professional development skills and that can be relatable to your future employment. 

In order to complete this unit successfully, students will need to have presented a Research Proposal which receives approval as assessment 1, before any research commences.

You will undertake this project under supervision in order to maximise the opportunity to fulfil your potential in these areas.   

Violence In Modern Society

This unit offers a critical examination of violence as a social and cultural phenomenon. It will take into consideration legal definitions of violent crime and examine violence in its different forms, incorporating those forms which are less likely to be perceived as crime, such as consensual sexual violence, violence against children, violence as entertainment and violence as rite and ritual.

To understand the complex issues surrounding violence, culture and society, it is necessary to explore a variety of theoretical and disciplinary approaches used by social scientists in order to both explain violence and understand the contexts in which forms of violence occurs, including gaining an understanding of how violence constructs and is constructed by
the socio-cultural context in which it occurs.

Political violence in the case of terrorism and the states responses will be considered alongside violence against specific groups or individuals - for example, racial or homophobic violence. The history of violence as a component of society will also be considered as will the willingness of ‘the public’ to participate in violent acts of torture, execution and humiliation as public spectacle. In particular these representations of violence have strongly featured in ‘entertainment’ and this will form a focus of study through the analysis of a variety of media forms.