Bachelor of Science in Digital Design

at Brunel University London United Kingdom

On Brunel’s Computer Science BSc course, we’ll help you gain the ability to develop software solutions to business problems. You’ll learn to specify, design, code, modify and test different types of software, from web-based systems to mobile solutions, in a contemporary programming paradigm. All of this will be done using an appropriate commercial grade development environment and associated database tools.

In addition, you’ll acquire in-depth knowledge of algorithms, design, programming and testing techniques. By the end of the course, you’ll have confidence in your knowledge of common system and network architectures and system development approaches, requirements capture, design methods, models, tools, and techniques.

You’ll become well-versed in implementing and testing systems and software maintenance. Key to this course is cultivating a reflective approach to project management issues arising from team-based software development.

This exciting degree course is also increasingly using technologies such as drones and robots in coursework and projects.

Our course is designed for flexibility, so if you’re not sure which route you want to go, you can select modules and specialise gradually during your time with us. You can transfer between Computer Science and Business Computing up to the start of Level 2, then, should you wish, to choose a specialism up to the start of Level 3.

We know that when you graduate, you’ll be working on large projects. That’s why one third of each year of our programmes is project-based. On Levels 1 and 2, you’ll build a software solution in a team, and in your final year you’ll carry out an individual project. You’ll also have the opportunity to showcase your projects at the annual  Made in Brunel (Software Innovation) event, with awards presented by the likes of Cisco, Sky and Xerox.

As part of your degree course, you’ll have the chance to take a year-long work placement between your second year and third year. We’ll support you in finding that all-important paid professional experience, in the UK or abroad. The feedback we’ve received is that those who have taken a placement are much more likely to find a job for which their degree was a formal requirement as it gives you a competitive advantage. Recent graduates have gone on to work for well-known names such as Accenture, Toshiba, Microsoft, British Airways, O2, and Barclays.

Our programmes are accredited by the British Computer Society, the Chartered Institute for IT, for the purposes of fully meeting the academic requirement for registration as a Chartered IT Professional (CITP), and on behalf of the Engineering Council, for the purposes of fully meeting the academic requirement for Incorporated Engineer (IEng) and partially meeting the academic requirement for a Chartered Engineer (CEng). 

The accreditation also allows you to apply for professional membership of the BCS after you have successfully completed your degree.

The department has been awarded an Athena SWAN Bronze, recognising our dedication to the advancement of gender equality in STEM subjects. We now have an ongoing three-year action plan to further implement strategies and improve our practices. As part of this endeavour, Brunel’s  Women in Engineering and Computing mentoring scheme provides our female students with invaluable help and support from the industry.

By specialising in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), you will learn how to understand the user experience (UX), and to use the insights you gain to help build systems that better meet the user’s needs. Through a mixture of theory and real-world practice, you’ll learn how to assess organisational problems and apply solutions. We’ll teach you how to determine a dynamic mix of processes, which allow information delivery systems and users to carry out business effectively and efficiently. You’ll come to intuitively understand how an organisation’s information systems need to adapt to the changes and developments natural to growth and progress.

Featured modules include software development and management, usability engineering and process modelling, e-business, and social media. Other Web 2.0 technologies and simulation modelling also feature.

Our course is designed for flexibility, so if you’re not sure which route you want to go down, you can select modules and specialise gradually during your time with us. You can transfer between Computer Science and Business Computing up to the start of Level 2, then should you wish, you can choose a specialism up to the start of Level 3.

We know that when you graduate, you’ll be working on large projects. That’s why one third of each year of our programmes is project-based. On Levels 1 and 2, you’ll build a software solution in a team, and in your final year you’ll carry out an individual project. You’ll also have the opportunity to showcase your projects at the annual Made in Brunel (Software Innovation) event, with awards presented by the likes of Cisco, Sky and Xerox.

As part of your degree course, you’ll have the chance to take a year-long work placement between your second year and third year. We’ll support you in finding that all-important paid professional experience, in the UK or abroad. The feedback we’ve received is that those who have taken a placement are much more likely to find a job for which their degree was a formal requirement as it gives you a competitive advantage. Recent graduates have gone on to work for well-known names such as Accenture, Toshiba, Microsoft, British Airways, O2, and Barclays.

Our programmes are accredited by the British Computer Society, the Chartered Institute for IT, for the purposes of fully meeting the academic requirement for registration as a Chartered IT Professional (CITP). The accreditation also allows you to apply for professional membership of the BCS after you have successfully completed your degree

The department has been awarded an Athena SWAN Bronze, recognising our dedication to the advancement of gender equality in STEM subjects. We now have an ongoing three-year action plan to further implement strategies and improve our practices. As part of this endeavour, Brunel’s Women in Engineering and Computing mentoring scheme provides our female students with invaluable help and support from the industry.

This course has a placement option. Find out more about work placements available.

Our Civil Engineering with Sustainability MEng degree is a highly innovative course that has been developed to equip you with a broad range of knowledge and management skills to meet the real world needs of the civil engineering and construction industry.

You will study the traditional elements of civil engineering including design, structures, materials, fluid mechanics, geotechnics and maths. You’ll be introduced to a range of sustainable infrastructure topics and then progress to specialist subjects such as water and wastewater engineering. Then you’ll move on to advanced topics including project management, and structural analysis and FEA.

Access is available to custom-designed technical facilities to work on your laboratory experiments. These include fluids and hydraulics laboratories, and structures, materials and geotechnics labs. The latest industry standard engineering software packages are available for you to use in dedicated computer clusters.

During your studies, there is a residential field trip with hands-on experience in surveying and geology using industry standard equipment. You will also benefit from guest lectures delivered by industry professionals, as well as visits to construction sites and civil engineering development projects.

Due to recent changes to the engineering curriculum, our accreditation is currently being reconfirmed with the Joint Board of Moderators (JBM). The JBM compromises the Institution of Civil Engineers, the Institution of Structural Engineers, the Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation, and the Institute of Highway Engineers. We have every expectation that our accreditation will be renewed later in the academic year.

This MEng degree in civil engineering with sustainability can be studied full-time over four years, or five years with a placement year. The MEng degree fully meets the educational requirement to fast track you to Chartered Engineer (CEng) status.  

We encourage the placement year option. This time in industry helps you to further prepare for the world of work and you’ll have a year’s worth of invaluable professional experience when you graduate. If you decide to go on an engineering placement year, you will have the opportunity to work in the civil engineering sector. It could be for a contractor, consultant or government authority.

Brunel Engineers is an annual exhibition that showcases our engineering talent at its finest. It’s a great way for you to network with key civil engineering enterprises and experts and show them the innovative, creative and enterprising work you have produced during your time at Brunel.

The main aim of this MSc course is to provide a more general MSc programme for Civil Engineering students and engineering professionals who wish to enhance their skills which covers all main sub-disciplines of Civil Engineering. The course MSc Civil Engineering is designed to include subjects from across the major sub-disciplines of Civil Engineering and equip our students with holistic knowledge and experience in Civil Engineering.

From the perspective of the needs of industry and government, such graduates with a broader understanding of Civil Engineering problems would be able to contribute to global challenges that require more holistic knowledge such as fulfilling UN Sustainable Development Goals (https://sdgs.un.org/goals) and addressing climate emergency. The structure of the programme includes seven compulsory modules and seven optional modules, two of which must be taken. A range of compulsory and optional modules are provided from all Civil Engineering sub-disciplines such as Structural Engineering, Geotechnical Engineering, Water and Hydraulic Engineering and Project and Infrastructure Management.

Students will access our technical laboratory facilities in various fields of Structural, Geotechnical and Hydraulic Engineering during the delivery of the modules and for their MSc dissertations. The latest industry-standard engineering software packages are available for students to use in the purpose-built computer laboratories which can be also used for their dissertation works.

The aims of this MSc course are:

• Offer postgraduate education in Civil Engineering with a broad knowledge/experience from all major sub-disciplines within Civil Engineering
• Provide advanced design capabilities and required versatilities for contributing to the most complicated contemporary Civil Engineering tasks in industry

Provide a solid pathway for graduates towards their continuing professional development and potential progression to the membership/chartership of appropriate institutions such as the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE), The Institution of Structural Engineers (IStructE) and The Chartered Institution of Water and Environment Management (CIWEM).

This course will help you to develop your creative writing skills and focus on how they relate to games design and game play. You’ll learn about the application of traditional story and narrative design and how it applies to games design and gameplay.

Your learning will come through lectures, workshops, seminars, play sessions and tutorials. You’ll also use the online forum to discuss, share and develop your knowledge. You’ll gain confidence in sharing your ideas, giving and receiving feedback and working individually as well as in a multi-disciplinary team.

The teaching team are experts in nurturing games talent and you will benefit from their insight into the industry. You will be introduced to ideas at the forefront of the discipline as well as sharing their knowledge and understanding of professional practice. This will help to keep you up-to-date with industry developments and show you how the skills you learn on this course are applicable to the world of work.

Of course the best teachers of writing are writers and Creative Writing at Brunel is taught by successful, published writers, many of whom have international reputations. You will draw on their experience across a range of genres and you will have the opportunity to study Creative Writing to a high level.  You will develop your knowledge, understanding, and analytical and creative skills through the analysis, interpretation and creation of literary texts.

All games students will have 24-hour access to the games lab, where high spec PCs are available for you to work on and play games. You will also use the Design room, where an impressive collection of board games is available for you to learn and understand the principles of games design. This room also serves as a wonderful, collaborative space where you can play and generate ideas, work, relax and have fun.

You’ll finish this course with a skillset that will allow you to develop a game from scratch and be ready to work and thrive in the games industry.

Storytelling is part of every culture and reveals much about a person’s lived experience, values and aspirations within a given time, whether presented as drama or prose on a page.

Theatre and English BA will help you to become a critical and creative communicator equipped for a variety of creative roles as you discover the richness of theatre making and literature side by side, developing as a creative along the way.

The theatrical side of your course will teach you specialist skills in a range of performance genres like physical, musical and digital theatre.

A blended approach to learning means you’ll have a mix of practical classes in acting, writing and ensemble production, together with more theoretically focussed content, with plenty of opportunities for collaboration.

You’ll learn theatre in Brunel’s purpose-built Antonin Artaud Performance Centre (AA), which is rather like being in drama school with its main theatre, two studio spaces, rehearsal rooms and recording studios.

AA facilities regularly host Arts@Artaud nights showcasing new music, film, creative writing and drama presented by Brunel students.

The English half of your course commences with a module on ‘Reading Resilience’ to help prepare you with the necessary skills for literary studies.

In years two and three a wealth of optional modules await you covering a variety of periods and genres from Shakespeare to Jane Austen, to contemporary and genre fiction.

Established links with the creative industries offer plenty of opportunities to hear from guest speakers and alumni on campus. Off campus, Brunel’s easy access to central London helps to facilitate regular class trips to explore theatre and culture.

Uniquely for a theatre degree, the option of a work placement year is an unmissable opportunity to find out where your interests lie and to increase your attractiveness to future employers.

Students from the course have completed placements in a variety of organisations including the London’s Park Theatre, Rose Wisksteed Casting, Unicorn Theatre and Icarus Theatre Company.

The Brunel Management MSc offers students a critically aware understanding of management and organisations relevant to their career path. This is achieved through the study of organisations, their management and the changing contexts in which they operate.

You will gain an advanced and applied understanding of contextual forces on organisations – be they legal, ethical, economic, environmental, social and technological; together with business strategy, markets and customers, financial management, and the management and development of people.

Career progression and finding suitable jobs are key for our students, so employment experience is part of the degree course with the option of a six to twelve week or yearlong work placement. From your placement you identify a project, linked to the dissertation, and produce an internal consultancy report for the company. 

The Brunel Management MSc allows you to study general business management or to select a specialist pathway which reflects your strengths and interests.

If you start your course in September you can study one year full-time,16 months full-time (with a 6-12 weeks placement), or two years full-time (with one year's placement). If you start your course in January, you can study 15 months full-time, 19 months full-time (with 6-12 weeks placement), or 27 months (with one year's placement).

The four pathways for the Management MSc are

Management (General Management) MSc
Develop a generalised knowledge of theory and its practical applications to business, public sector and third sector organisations.

Management (Marketing and Brand Management) MSc
A mix of general management study with specialism in marketing and branding issues followed by a related dissertation topic.

Management (Technology and Innovation Management) MSc
Combine a study of general management with technology and innovation issues followed by a related dissertation topic.

Management (Digital Entrepreneurship and Creativity Management) MSc
Gain knowledge of general management while studying issues related to the media industry and media management followed by a related dissertation topic.

You will be given the opportunity to choose your specialist Management MSc degree pathway in induction week, and to choose elective modules during the first two weeks of your course. You can attend different pathway-related and elective classes, in order to help you make your choice by the end of the two-week period.

If you are late to enrol, you will be given information on arrival relating to your pathway and elective options. However, you will be expected to make your final choices within 48 hours of enrolment.

Do you want to report on news from the most interesting and important parts of the world? Are you committed to a career in journalism but need the professional skills? If so, this one-year journalism postgraduate course provides excellent preparation for working across all platforms.

From the moment you start Brunel’s International Journalism degree, you will learn to deliver high-quality video, audio, online and print journalism geared towards global audiences.

Course content is designed to equip you with digital, multi-platform journalism skills and advanced understanding of the context of journalism in the fast-changing world of news media.

You will study a synthesis of practical and theoretical skills modules contextualising different forms of journalistic practice, within a framework of technological, political and cultural change. This is challenging, employment-orientated study on a leading journalism course at a London university that focusses on international reporting.

You will benefit greatly from our academic’s research strengths and excellent links with the journalism, broadcasting and publishing industries, with the option to seek a work placement during your time on the course.

Additionally, alumni and industry guest speakers will bring further insight and inspiration about what it means to work within global media.  

You will also get plenty of hands-on training and practice in the University’s well-equipped media suite that mimics the recording and broadcast facilities used within the industry.

International Journalism MA will appeal to a broad range of candidates with an interest in journalism across all sectors, including print journalism, online journalism, radio journalism, TV journalism and especially in areas of convergence.

Delve into a degree that will teach you the intricacies of how societies work and learn to understand how people cope with inevitable societal changes on our exciting Sociology BSc. You’ll develop the skills to put yourself in other peoples’ shoes as you study their behaviour and understand why they think in a certain way.

Your degree will give you a thorough understanding of how social issues such as poverty, unemployment, social conflict, and the social and economic consequences of rapid and profound industrial and economic change are redefined by contemporary processes of individualisation, globalisation and the growth of new forms of communication.

The first year is designed to offer you a solid base in theoretical and methodological innovations in sociology. As you progress through the course, you will be able to choose modules you are interested in to actively shape and apply your learning to the issues you wish to interrogate. In your third year, you’ll work on a dissertation focusing on an area of interest of your choice. Your dissertation can be a theoretical or practical dissertation, so you can work to your own strengths.

Depending on the modules you choose, you may have the option go on fieldtrips where you will be able to apply your learning to current issues and broaden your theoretical imagination. Previous fieldtrips have included: Barbican; British Board of Film Classification; London Migration Museum; Museum of Comedy; Museum of London; regeneration areas (e.g. Spitalfields, Smithfield); and the Victoria and Albert Museum.

As you’ll be taught and supported by academics who are not only experts in their field but are actively engaged in research, you’ll develop skills that can be applied from the classroom to the workplace. They know the industry inside out, so you know you are learning from experienced professionals who will bring their unique insights into the classroom and will ensure your learning is up-to-date.

Gain an insight into life after your studies by putting your learning into practice by opting for a one-year work placement or two short placements for six months at a time. You will graduate with valuable work experience to enhance your employment prospects and will be able to develop an understanding the working world. We have excellent links with a wide range of notable external organisations, so you will have the opportunity to apply for high quality placements across London.

Some of our sociology students have done their placements abroad working as teachers in Ghana. Others have undertaken placements at a variety of companies including Deluxe Entertainment, the Disney Channel, the Home Office, British Youth Council, Citizens Advice Bureau and the Department of Work and Pensions.

This is a broad-based degree which will enable and encourage you to specialise in areas which particularly fascinate you. As a graduate of this dynamic degree, you will leave us with various transferable skills that are key to the contemporary employment market. 

Accounting data and analysis lies at the very heart of good management. It provides vital information for investors and other external parties, and brings clarity to major decision-making in business management. If you have a business-related degree and want to develop your understanding of accounting and management in a business context, our Accounting and Business Management MSc is for you.

This integrated programme will develop your theoretical knowledge and your practical skills, giving you a robust foundation of knowledge to build upon. You will acquire technical accounting skills, understand the ins and outs of financial reporting, and learn about quantitative and qualitative research methods.

Understanding the role of stakeholders and the influence of regulatory frameworks on accounting and management, both domestically and internationally will give you the edge in the global market.

The Accounting and Business Management MSc is accredited by ACCA, CIMA, ICAEW and AIA providing you with a range of exemptions that stop you from having to study the same topics that you've already been taught. Find out more on our accreditations and exemptions page.