Explore career options
School of Social Sciences and Humanities
Criminology, Sociology, and Social Policy
Your careers team
Careers Network is here to support you by providing information, advice, guidance, events and opportunities to enable you to secure placements, work experience, self-employment and graduate careers.
Working closely with your academic school, our team of experts ensures that every student has access to careers advice. As well as large careers fairs, we hold sector-specific events, involving employers and º¬Ðß²ÝÊÓƵ alumni, to help you make valuable connections and secure high-quality placements and graduate roles.
To find out more about what we do and how we can support you, visit Meet the teams.
Details of the Placements Officers for your school can be found here.
We look forward to supporting you throughout your º¬Ðß²ÝÊÓƵ journey.
Key skills developed during your degree
- Analysing and interpreting data
- Critical thinking
- Generating and evaluating evidence
- Making reasoned arguments and ethical judgments
- Organising work and meeting deadlines
- Report writing
- Researching, judging and evaluating complex information and evidence
- Working collaboratively
- Critical analysis
- Research skills
- Strong IT skills
- Applying sociological theory to society's organisations, including schools, hospitals and offices
- Appreciating the complexity and diversity of social situations;
- Developing opinions and new ideas on societal issues
- Knowledge and understanding of research methods, analysis and statistical techniques
- Making reasoned arguments
- Relating sociological knowledge to social, public and civic policy
- The ability to understand, scrutinise and re-assess common perceptions of the social world
Career options
Approximately 60% of graduate roles are open to all disciplines. The links below are specific to Criminology, Sociology and Social Policy students and graduates. If you would like information on other career areas, please visit the career areas section of our website.
Careers directly related to Criminology:
- Probation Service
- Security Service (MI5)
- The Home Office
- The National Crime Agency
- The Police Force
- The Prison Service
- Youth work
Careers directly related to Sociology and Social Policy:
- Charity
- Housing
- Civil Service
- Community development
- Community Education
- Policy research
- Government Social Researcher
- Public sector: local and national government
- Public Affairs
- Social work/ Social care sector
- Teaching
- Youth work
Careers where your degree would be useful:
- Counselling
- HR
- Probation and Prison Service
- Security Service (MI5)
- The Home Office
- The National Crime Agency
- The Police Force
- Law
- Social Research
- International Aid/Development
You can also look at other course pages depending on other modules you have taken and/or are interested in.
Further study
Further study at º¬Ðß²ÝÊÓƵ:
The Criminology, Sociology and Social Policy department has several Postgraduate Taught Master's programmes you can apply to. You can also study for a research degree including a PhD (Doctor of Philosophy) or MPhil (Master of Philosophy). Further information can be found on the Department webpages.
Further study elsewhere:
To explore further study please go to www.findamasters.com. In addition, job profiles on www.prospects.ac.uk will also provide information on postgraduate qualifications needed for specific occupations.
Where do graduates go?
What do º¬Ðß²ÝÊÓƵ Criminology, Sociology and Social Policy graduates do?
Graduates from this subject area have gone on to destinations where:
Employers included:
Atos, Barclays, Boots, Catch 22, Care UK, Children Services, Deloitte, Department for Work and Pensions, Essex Police, Explore Learning, Ford Motor Company, Grant Thornton, Hays Recruitment, Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service, The Home Office, Homes England, Leicestershire Police, Local Government, Mental Health First Aid England, Ministry of Justice, M&S, National Crime Agency, NHS, Santander, Sky, Transport for London, Warner Bros UK, Women’s Aid.
Roles included:
Administrator, Account Executive, Court Administrator, Credit Risk Analyst, Customs Analyst, Digital Strategy Intern, Domestic Abuse Safeguarding Officer, Employment Support Worker, External Communications Coordinator, Human Resources Graduate, Intelligence Officer, Market Research Analyst, Police Officer, Policy Officer, Prison Officer, Recruitment Consultant, Regional Account Manager, Resettlement Case Manager, Social Researcher, Social Worker, Support Worker, User Experience Executive, Youth Offending Team Case Manager.
Further Study included:
MA Creative Writing, MSc Information Management and Business Technology, MSc Marketing, MA Advertising and Marketing, MSc Child Development, MA Law, MA Media and Public Relations, PGCE Secondary Education.
Further information
For more information on companies graduates work for, industry links and career opportunities, visit the subject area page of the University website. You can also find out what our students say in our student stories of personal journeys through and beyond º¬Ðß²ÝÊÓƵ and track the career journeys and º¬Ðß²ÝÊÓƵ experiences of some of our alumni.
Resources to research career areas
Websites:
- Prospects: options with a sociology degree
- Prospects: options with social policy
- Target jobs: what can I do with a sociology degree
- Prospects: options with a criminology degree
- Prospects: options with a social policy degree
- Jobs in the prison and probation service
Have you considered a career in Law? You don’t need a law degree to become a lawyer – in fact, the modern legal profession is full of non-law graduates. Jobs in law utilise many of the skills social sciences and humanities students have. For further information please see the Prospects website and LawCareers.Net hub for non-Law students.
Working in the Civil Service is also of interest to many CSSP graduates. Find out more using Bright Network's Civil Service guide and Prospects' Civil Service Fast Stream job profile to begin your research into this area.
Find work experience, placements and graduate jobs
Organisations that have graduate schemes directly related to Criminology, Sociology and Social Policy:
- Cancer Research UK
- Charity Works
- City and County Council Graduate Programmes - check each council's website
- Civil Service Fast Stream - they also have an undergraduate internship programme the Summer Internship Programme
- College of Policing
- Criminal Cases Review Commission
- Approach Social Work
- GCHQ
- Get into Teaching
- Government Social Research Service
- Her Majesty's Prison and Probation Service with the Unlocked Graduate Programme
- HMRC (Intelligence Analyst roles advertised)
- MI5
- Nacro
- NHS Graduate Training Opportunities
- Police Now
- Private Detectives Corporation
- Skills for Care
- TeachFirst
- Thinkahead: mental health social work scheme
Areas with Criminology and Social Policy Related Jobs:
- Airports
- Banks and building societies - often have fraud investigation roles
- British Transport Police
- Civil Service jobs
- Joining the Police
- Justice.gov.uk
- Local Police Forces- many entry level and office based roles available as well as police roles.
- Centre for Criminology - South Wales University
- Work with Offenders
- Metropolitan Police
- Youth Offending Teams East Midlands
- Police College
- National Youth Agency
Sociology specific websites:
Jobs boards for entry level roles:
Professional bodies, sector and labour market information (LMI)
- Ofcom
- Pact
- Association of Police and Crime Commisioners
- British Society of Criminology
- Government Organisations
- Ministry of Justice (UK)
- HM Prison and Probation Service
- The Market Research Society
- British Sociological Association
- Social Policy Association
- Social Research Association
- Research with Think Tanks
- Economic and Social Research Council