Key facts

Average number of students offered a place per year

2

Average number of applicants per year

4

Education is one of the most powerful means for change and growth in the modern world. If you’re interested in the psychology, politics or social and cultural contexts of education and learning, you can study it on our Education course.

A Level: Our standard conditional offer for this subject is usually A*AA at A level or 40 - 42 points overall and 7, 7, 6 at Higher Level in IB.  All Colleges may modify offers to take account of individual circumstances.  Further information can be found here

For Education, English, Drama and the Arts, A level (or equivalent) English Literature is highly desirable. 

For Education, Policy and International Development and Education, Psychology and Learning, A level (or equivalent) subjects relevant to the track you wish to study would be useful.

For other qualification and equivalency information please see the main University admissions pages.

Links to the Education page on the main Undergraduate Admissions site: www.undergraduate.study.cam.ac.uk/courses/education

Education at Cambridge

The course at Cambridge is a rigorous and rewarding interdisciplinary degree. You follow one of three tracks, combining in-depth study of a particular field of interest with an examination of wider educational and social issues.

Education is the study of human development and transformation in all its forms and contexts: from the individual mind to the social and political processes taking place within communities, institutions and global networks to the cultural encounters that shape ideas, beliefs and imaginations. Our course allows you to explore these themes across academic disciplines, or develop specialist knowledge in areas such as psychology, international development, or literature and theatre. Creativity, contemporary research and global dimensions are key to this critical understanding and the programme has a particular focus on nurturing independent, reflexive inquiry through the development of critical research skills.

Facilities and resources

The Faculty of Education has excellent resources and state-of-the-art research facilities, including a psychology laboratory and a library that houses one of the UK’s best education collections. Active research forms the foundation of our teaching so you’re taught by academics at the forefront of their fields and who specialise in cutting-edge research.

Further study and professional qualifications

Our course provides excellent preparation for a wide range of Masters and doctoral research programmes, both at Cambridge and elsewhere.

Alternatively, for those intending to teach, the course provides a foundation from which to proceed to initial teacher training in primary education.

After Cambridge

The career options for graduates are extremely varied and they find employment in a wide range of occupations in the UK and abroad. As well as further study and teaching, our students have gone into research, educational psychology and neuroscience, publishing, and the Civil Service. Others now work in government policy and administration, the media, theatre, heritage and museum education, HR, business and consultancy, charities and NGOs, and international development.

Course outline

This flexible interdisciplinary programme offers a broad, compulsory introduction in year one, followed by the opportunity to select papers across a range of disciplines, or to focus more closely on a particular area you may be interested in exploring in more depth.

You attend approximately four to six lectures and seminars, and one or two hours of supervision per week.

You are assessed at the end of each year. Depending on the papers studied, this will be through practical work, coursework, written examination, or a combination of these. In the third year, all students also submit a dissertation.

 Year 1 (Part I)

You take four compulsory papers, which together will engage you with elements of history, philosophy, psychology, sociology, literature and the arts, drawing on scholarship from the UK and a range of international contexts, which will provide a strong foundation to support you in a range of more specialist options in Part II.

Introduction to Education, Systems and Disciplines
Learning and Human Development
Education, Creativity and Culture
Education and Social Justice

Year 2 (Part IIA)

 

In Year 2, you take four papers. Two are compulsory, and are designed to provide you with the foundations of Education research, in preparation for the dissertation in Part IIB.

Designing Educational Research
Dissertation: Literature Review

You will then choose two further papers from a list designed to build on the core foundations provided in Part I. You will have the opportunity to design your own pathway, which can be pursued further in Part IIB. You may choose to specialise, for example in psychology, literature or international development. Alternatively, you may select papers which allow you to pursue your interests across a range of disciplines. For examples of the papers which may be offered, please see Part IIB.

Year 3 (Part II)

In Year 3, you take four papers: a compulsory dissertation of 8,000 to 10,000 words which will allow you to pursue a research project into a relevant area of particular interest to you, and three further papers from a list of options, again designed to give you the flexibility to pursue your interests, whether these are specialist or more general. Examples of papers which may be offered include:

Language, Communication and Literacies
Children’s Literature
Modernity, Globalisation and Education
Theatre: Text and Production
Education, Neuroscience and Society
Formal and Informal Contexts of Learning
Changing Landscapes of Childhood and Youth: History, Experience and Culture
Critical Debates in Education and International Development
Case Studies in Education, Policy and International Development
Towards a Transnational Sociology of Education: Space, Power and Politics
Play, Creativities and Imagination
International Literatures and Cultures
Performance, Education and Society