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English and Creative Writing

Entry requirements


A level

B,B,B-B,B,C

112-120 points to include a minimum of 2 A levels, including a relevant subject.

112-122 Tariff points from the Access to HE Diploma in a relevant subject.

Cambridge Pre-U score of 46-50, to include a Principal Subject in a relevant subject.

GCSE/National 4/National 5

3 GCSEs at grade C or above to include English/3 GCSEs at grade 4 or above to include English.

International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme

25

25 points from the IB Diploma, to include 3 Higher Level subjects, including a relevant subject.

Leaving Certificate - Higher Level (Ireland) (first awarded in 2017)

H3,H3,H3,H3,H4-H3,H3,H3,H3,H3


To include a Higher Level relevant subject.

Acceptable when combined with other qualifications. Must be with a qualification in a relevant subject.

Acceptable when combined with other qualifications.

Pearson BTEC Level 3 National Extended Diploma (first teaching from September 2016)

DDM-DMM

Acceptable when combined with other qualifications. Must be with a qualification in a relevant subject.

112-120 Tariff points to include a minimum of 2 Advanced Highers, including a relevant subject.

Acceptable when combined with other qualifications.

UCAS Tariff

112-120

112-120 points to include a minimum of 2 A levels, or equivalent, including a relevant subject.

112-120 points from the Advanced Welsh Baccalaureate including 1 A level in a relevant subject, plus the Advanced Skills Challenge Certificate.

You may also need to…

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About this course


This course has alternative study modes. Contact the university to find out how the information below might vary.

Course option

3years

Full-time | 2024

Other options

4 years | Sandwich | 2024

Subjects

Creative writing

English literature

**This is a Connected Degree**

Portsmouth is the only University in the UK with the flexibility to choose when to do an optional paid placement or self-employed year. Either take a placement in your third year, or finish your studies first and complete a placement in your fourth year. You can decide if and when to take a placement after you've started your course.

**Overview**

Take your love of literature to a higher level and refine your writing skills with academic rigour on our English and Creative Writing degree course.

Explore literature through an academic lens in theory and in practice, enhancing your understanding of each through participation in the other.

You'll learn to analyse literature as a critic, historian and linguist, and from the perspective of future creators, storytellers, playwrights and poets – all of which will transform your writing skills. Develop techniques for producing short stories, poetry and plays, and learn to dissect, critique and perform your own writing.

By the end of your degree, you’ll open up professional career paths and postgraduate routes eager for writing and literary expertise, including editing and publishing, teaching, and broadcasting.

**Course highlights**

- Take part in Portsmouth's annual Comic Con for the latest developments in creative writing and literature, popular culture, fan communities, and technology – course lecturers and students are panelists

- Build your writing portfolio by contributing to our course blog The Eldon Review and our local news zine Star & Crescent

- Contribute to cultural preservation projects with staff members, such as the Portsmouth Literary Map and the Writing Literary Portsmouth blog, to enhance your research practice

- Learn from experts in both creative writing and English literature: from published novelists and industry-active writers, to renowned specialists of 19th to 21st-century literature and culture

- Gain valuable professional experience by taking an optional placement

- Spend a year or a semester studying abroad to discover another culture and way of learning

- Take advantage of our extra-curricular Institute-Wide Language Programme to improve your linguistic skills and earn credits

**Careers and opportunities**

An excellent writer and speaker will prosper in a vast field of career opportunities.

You’ll graduate from this course with outstanding writing and speaking skills, as well as proofreading and grammar proficiency. All of these qualities will help you from the moment you write your first job application.

You’ll also have developed excellent skills in imagination, empathy, and research, which are valuable assets to any employer.

Graduate areas

Areas graduates from our Creative Writing courses have worked in include:

- creative writing (prose, poetry, script)

- advertising and marketing

- arts and events management

- local and community broadcasting

- teaching

- stand-up comedy

- travel industry

Graduate roles

Roles graduates from our Creative Writing courses have gone onto include:

- novelist

- poet

- playwright

- teacher

- copywriter

- journalist

- theatre manager

- editorial assistant

Graduate destinations

Some of our graduates have landed spots in big companies and organisations, including:

- BBC Radio 1

- Red Magazine

You'll get help and support from our Careers and Employability service in finding your first role and for 5 years after you graduate.

Modules

Year 1
Core modules in this year include:
- Body Politics
- Telling Tales
- the Short Story: Murder, Madness and Experimentation
- Tips, Tricks, Techniques
- True Stories

There are no optional modules in this year.

Year 2
Core modules in this year include:
- Literary Prizes and Public Acclaim

Optional modules in this year include:
- Film, Media and Communication Study Exchange
- Finding Form - Fiction
- Finding Form - Nonfiction
- Creative Writing For Film
- Crime Writing
- Dystopian and Apocalyptic Environments: Ecocrisis in the Literary Imagination
- Finding Form - Fiction
- Finding Form - Nonfiction
- Women's Writing in the Americas
- Creative Writing and Critical Thinking
- Research in Practice
- Bloody Shakespeare: the Politics and Poetics of Violence
- Creative Writing and Critical Thinking
- Engaged Citizenship Through Interdisciplinary Practice
- Finding Form - Speculative Fiction
- Modern Foreign Language
- Press and Public Relations
- Professional Experience
- Puritans to Postmodernists: American Literature
- Research in Practice
- Space, Place and Being
- Student Enterprise

Placement year (optional)
On this course, you can do an optional work placement year between your 2nd and 3rd years to get valuable experience working in industry. We’ll help you secure a work placement that fits your situation and ambitions. You’ll get mentoring and support throughout the year.

Year 3
There are no core modules in this year.

Optional modules in this year include:
- Creative Writing Dissertation
- Dissertation (English Literature)
- Advanced Screenwriting
- Fact and Fiction
- Fan Fiction
- Holocaust Literatures
- US Masculinities
- Consuming Fictions: Food and Appetite in Victorian Culture
- Magical Realism
- Time, Temporality, Contemporary Fiction
- Travel Writing: Global and Local Engagements
- Writing Project (with Publishing)

We use the best and most current research and professional practice alongside feedback from our students to make sure course content is relevant to your future career or further studies.

Therefore, some course content may change over time to reflect changes in the discipline or industry and some optional modules may not run every year. If a module doesn’t run, we’ll let you know as soon as possible and help you choose an alternative module.

Assessment methods

You’ll be assessed through:

- short stories
- a novel in progress
- a screenplay
- a collection of poems
- a video production
- presentations
- reports
- a research portfolio
- examinations
- dissertation/project

You’ll be able to test your skills and knowledge informally before you do assessments that count towards your final mark.

You can get feedback on all practice and formal assessments so you can improve in the future.

The way you’re assessed may depend on the modules you select. As a guide, students on this course last year were typically assessed as follows:

- Year 1 students: 8% by written exams, 17% by practical exams and 75% by coursework
- Year 2 students: 8% by written exams and 92% by coursework
- Year 3 students: 100% by coursework

Tuition fees

Select where you currently live to see what you'll pay:

Channel Islands
£9,250
per year
England
£9,250
per year
EU
£9,250
per year
International
£17,200
per year
Northern Ireland
£9,250
per year
Republic of Ireland
£9,250
per year
Scotland
£9,250
per year
Wales
£9,250
per year

The Uni


Course location:

University of Portsmouth

Department:

Faculty of Creative and Cultural Industries

Read full university profile

What students say


We've crunched the numbers to see if overall student satisfaction here is high, medium or low compared to students studying this subject(s) at other universities.

82%
Creative writing
95%
English literature

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.

Creative writing

Teaching and learning

88%
Staff make the subject interesting
94%
Staff are good at explaining things
88%
Ideas and concepts are explored in-depth
86%
Opportunities to apply what I've learned

Assessment and feedback

Feedback on work has been timely
Feedback on work has been helpful
Staff are contactable when needed
Good advice available when making study choices

Resources and organisation

65%
Library resources
86%
IT resources
79%
Course specific equipment and facilities
63%
Course is well organised and has run smoothly

Student voice

Staff value students' opinions
Feel part of a community on my course

Who studies this subject and how do they get on?

91%
UK students
9%
International students
34%
Male students
66%
Female students
94%
2:1 or above
16%
First year drop out rate

Most popular A-Levels studied (and grade achieved)

C
B
B

Literature in english

Teaching and learning

91%
Staff make the subject interesting
97%
Staff are good at explaining things
84%
Ideas and concepts are explored in-depth
83%
Opportunities to apply what I've learned

Assessment and feedback

Feedback on work has been timely
Feedback on work has been helpful
Staff are contactable when needed
Good advice available when making study choices

Resources and organisation

83%
Library resources
95%
IT resources
98%
Course specific equipment and facilities
79%
Course is well organised and has run smoothly

Student voice

Staff value students' opinions
Feel part of a community on my course

Who studies this subject and how do they get on?

95%
UK students
5%
International students
18%
Male students
82%
Female students
92%
2:1 or above
22%
First year drop out rate

Most popular A-Levels studied (and grade achieved)

C
C
C

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.

Creative writing

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.

£18,000
med
Average annual salary
100%
high
Employed or in further education
42%
med
Employed in a role where degree was essential or beneficial

Top job areas of graduates

24%
Artistic, literary and media occupations
18%
Sales assistants and retail cashiers
11%
Media professionals

The jobs market for this subject - which includes creative writing and scriptwriting courses - is not currently one of the strongest, so unemployment rates are currently looking quite high overall, with salaries on the lower side. But nevertheless, most graduates get jobs quickly. Graduates often go into careers as authors and writers and are also found in other roles where the ability to write well is prized, such as journalism, translation, teaching and advertising and in web content. Be aware that freelancing and self-employment is common is common in the arts, as are what is termed 'portfolio careers', having several part-time jobs or commissions at once - although graduates from this subject were a little more likely than many other creative arts graduates to be in conventional full time permanent contracts, so that might be worth bearing in mind.

Literature in english

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.

£18,000
med
Average annual salary
99%
high
Employed or in further education

Top job areas of graduates

17%
Sales, marketing and related associate professionals
16%
Sales assistants and retail cashiers
10%
Artistic, literary and media occupations

What about your long term prospects?

Looking further ahead, below is a rough guide for what graduates went on to earn.

Creative writing

The graph shows median earnings of graduates who achieved a degree in this subject area one, three and five years after graduating from here.

£18k

£18k

£22k

£22k

£26k

£26k

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.

Literature in english

The graph shows median earnings of graduates who achieved a degree in this subject area one, three and five years after graduating from here.

£18k

£18k

£22k

£22k

£26k

£26k

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 is what the university has told Ucas about the criteria they expect applicants to satisfy; some may be compulsory, others may be preferable.

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This is the percentage of applicants to this course who received an offer last year, through Ucas.

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This is what the university has told Ucas about the course. Use it to get a quick idea about what makes it unique compared to similar courses, elsewhere.

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Course location and department:

This is what the university has told Ucas about the course. Use it to get a quick idea about what makes it unique compared to similar courses, elsewhere.

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Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF):

We've received this information from the Department for Education, via Ucas. This is how the university as a whole has been rated for its quality of teaching: gold silver or bronze. Note, not all universities have taken part in the TEF.

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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.

Have a question about this info? Learn more here

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.

Have a question about this info? Learn more here

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.

Have a question about this info? Learn more here

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

Have a question about this info? Learn more here

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?

Have a question about this info? Learn more here