Careers Brief - Health & Social Care FdA
Overview
Health and social care is one of the largest employment sectors in the UK and opportunities are buoyant. However, to develop your career successfully, you will need to be prepared to do further training and preferably be mobile.
Your Foundation degree will have given you both a useful qualification and grounding in the fields of health and social care. Before deciding whether to continue on to complete the honours degree, you will need to take time to review your career plans, as alternative applied training courses might be more appropriate, particularly within the allied health professions.
Use the web links in Resources below to find out more about the variety of opportunities open to you, entry and training routes.
To consider a wider choice of careers, matched to your interests, use Prospects Planner and other tools listed in the main Career Planning section of this Guide.
Further Study
Shortened full-time Top-up degree courses are designed for direct entry from Foundation degrees.
On successful completion of your Foundation degree, you will be able to continue onto the BA (Hons) Health and Social Care Top-up degree at Bournemouth University.
Other institutions offering relevant top-up courses:
University of Brighton; University of the West of England, Bristol; University of Wales Institute, Cardiff; University of Central Lancashire; Cornwell; East Lancashire Institute of Higher Education at Blackburn College; University of Gloucestershire; University of Greenwich; Grimsby Institute of Further and Higher Education;
University of Kent; Leeds Metropolitan University; Middlesex University; Neath Port Talbot College; Northumbria University; university of Southampton; Somerset College of Arts & Technology; University of Wolverhampton; University of Worcester.
You could transfer into a related degree course. To search for suitable honours degree courses, use www.ucas.com/search . Use the university/college links for course details. Entry point would depend on the overlap between courses, your grades and experience.
You will need to use UCAS to apply for courses. Contact the Course Tutor of your chosen course to find out your position, before you make your formal application.
Find out how much this will cost you. Where is the funding coming from? Use the website www.aimhigher.ac.uk for information on student support.
Go to the main section on Further Study in this Guide for more information and help.
Resources
www.prospects.ac.uk
Graduate Prospects is the national careers website for higher education students in the UK:
- Drop down 'Career advice' and click on 'Your Foundation degree...what next?'
- Drop down 'Jobs & work' and click on 'Explore job sectors'. Go to 'Health' and 'Social care' and 'Voluntary' for excellent overviews on trends and opportunities. Click on 'key roles' and 'more roles' for job descriptions, entry qualifications, training, good website links and more.
- Drop down 'My Prospects' and click on 'What jobs would suit me?' for Prospects Planner
www.learndirect-advice.co.uk/helpwithyourcareer/jobprofiles
Learn Direct - national learning advice
www.connexions-direct.com/jobs4u
Jobs4U Careers Database - click on 'Job Families & Articles'
jobseekers.direct.gov.uk
Careers database and links to jobs nationally. Search by either clicking on 'careers' and 'choosing a category' or typing in job title.
www.nhscareers.nhs.uk
National Health Service site - find out about careers in the NHS
www.jobs.nhs.uk
NHS jobs website
www.come2life.nhs.uk
NHS Management Training Scheme
www.socialworkandcare.co.uk
Social Care and Social Work careers information website for social work training and jobs in social care without a degree
www.basw.co.uk
British Association of Social Workers - information and jobs
www.dh.gov.uk
Department of Health site - news and recent developments
www.nmas.ac.uk
Nursing & Midwifery Admissions service for 'course directory' and applying'
http://targetjobs.co.uk
GTI (publisher) graduate jobs and careers
www.jobs.ac.uk/careers
Careers: Articles 'Working in the National Health Service'
www.careandhealth.com
Care and Health magazine - features and jobs
www.communitycare.co.uk
Community Care, the leading social care information provider - includes jobs and employer search
