Geography, BA (Hons), with industry placement

The study of geography remains highly relevant, encompassing topics from landscape evolution and population dynamics to the effects of climate change. At Swansea University, our BA in Geography with a year in industry is tailored for those seeking to boost employability in human geography and related fields. This program equips students with practical, numerical, and computational skills for careers in regional planning, environmental management, and beyond. It offers exceptional fieldwork opportunities in the UK, such as the Gower Peninsula, and internationally in locations like Austria or New York.Students explore key issues including environmental change, migration, and glaciology, guided by world-renowned academics in state-of-the-art facilities. The curriculum includes compulsory and optional modules across years one and two, a year-three industrial placement for transferable skills, and a year-four dissertation with advanced topics. Assessment involves exams, coursework, fieldwork, and tutorials, fostering a comprehensive learning experience.

In Year 1 you’ll study several compulsory modules covering topics such as global environmental change, people place and nation, global shifts and sustainability. You will then choose from optional modules covering geographical skills and methods, writing skills and personal development planning and practical field projects, and topics such as mobilities and migration, urban geography and geology. In Year 2, you’ll choose from a range of optional modules covering data analysis, approaches to human and physical geography, and conducting social and environmental research. You’ll study topics such as geographic information systems, glacial environments and processes, creative geographies, quaternary environmental change, regional economic development and policy, boundaries and connections, global vegetation patterns and dynamics, political geographies, urban modelling and geological record of past environments. You’ll also have an opportunity to take part in an overseas field trip. In Year 3, you’ll spend a minimum of 40 weeks in an industrial placement in a UK company. Occasionally, opportunities may arise outside of the UK. You’ll receive support from our placements team during your 2nd year to help you prepare for and secure a relevant industrial placement. In Year 4, you’ll undertake your dissertation and choose from a range of optional modules covering topics such as migration, security and humanism, contemporary rural Britain, geographies of national identity, glaciology, humid tropical environments and landscapes, meteorology and atmospheric science, plate tectonics and global geophysics, World cities, environmental modelling and the climate of the last 1,000 years. You’ll also have the opportunity to undertake an interdisciplinary field trip to the Indian Himalayas (Sikkim).