Design Degrees Online

Honours Degree; evidence of experiential learning equivalent to a degree; or 3 years relevant professional experience. For the part time mode, you would need to be working in a design-related profession. Research interests, professional experience and personal goals are more important than the quality of your portfolio.

Suitable candidates
We believe that you can shape the world rather than accepting that it has to determine your future. The course offers an environment where people from, for example, business, marketing, fashion, product design, architecture to fine art can work together and individually to challenge to evolve a better world.
Our students come from all over the world and we celebrate and include their diverse cultural knowledge in our quest to create alternative paradigms. Students draw on each others professional and diverse cultural experience to provide critical and constructive insights that open up new ways of thinking and doing.

English language requirements
All classes are conducted in English, so you will be required to have a fluent understanding of the language. If English is not your first language you will be asked to provide evidence of your English language ability. We strongly advise international applicants to take an IELTS test as soon as they consider studying in the UK. Minimum scores for entry on to a postgraduate course are as follows:

IELTS (International English Language Testing System): 6.5

TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language): hand written test: 568-587, computer based test: 226-240

We provide free tuition in English for international students and regular workshops in the language of art and design. We also offer a number of short courses that enable students from overseas to improve their portfolios and English skills before applying to their chosen course.

Art and Education PGCert/PGDip/ MA

This course is intended for artists, teachers, lecturers, art therapists, art advisors, community arts workers, gallery education officers, health workers, and others with experience and interest in areas where art and education are important.

The course examines the foundations, theoretical issues, practices and inter-connectedness of art and education through a variety of discipline-based approaches. Different types of discourse are related to personal practice and the past, current and future relationship and development of art and education.

During the Postgraduate Certificate and the Postgraduate Diploma, two compulsory modules in art and education are studied, Histories of Art and Design Education and Current Issues in Art and Education. In addition, a choice of three modules can be made from eleven options covering current thinking in: philosophy and aesthetics; psychology/theory of art, including gender and identity issues; and a range of art therapeutic approaches.

The selection of modules, academic progress, planning in reading and writing, and academic guidance, is overseen by personal and module tutors. The MA research element is typically conducted by full-time mode in one year and part-time in to two years by dissertation.

About the course

This MA Design course is open to the designer, architect, artist or theorist, working in the field of the 3-D environment, who wishes to extend and redefine the theoretical and practical base of their subject at an advanced level.

The main component of the course is the personal project, supported by a core programme of lectures, seminars, and other events that focus on contemporary issues. The core programme comprises taught units of study, covering research methodology, contemporary design theory, digital media techniques, design practices and interdisciplinary studies. The MA personal project is your individual programme of work, developing an appropriate area of design expertise. This may be specialist or interdisciplinary, but should extend the boundaries of design through an exploration of methods, techniques, ideas and themes. The MA Design personal project is composed of three units of study: research, development and realisation. Each unit contains written and practical elements to develop work that is both philosophically reflective and technically accomplished. The final project may be either a design or a theoretical proposition supported by research and development work. The end of the course is concerned with the publication and dissemination of your MA project work. In this final phase you will work with practicing professionals to identify future audiences for your ideas and prepare yourself for the next stage of your career.
Project proposals

The course offers a flexible full time mode of study and can be completed over 1 or 2 years enabling those in work to realistically undertake postgraduate study. The Rochester campus offers MA students their own dedicated facilities including fully equipped digital workstations, seminar and tutorial space together with a full range of specialist workshops for making and production.

Toy Design

Award type: MA/PGDip/PGCert
Additional awards:
Delivery method: Standard
Course length:
Full time: - 18 months
Part time: - 30 months or longer

Course Outline

The MA Toy Design programme occupies a potentially unique position within the portfolio of postgraduate courses in the School of Design. Whilst sitting most closely to the MA Consumer Product Design, it is envisaged that students will also make use of the subject knowledge in MA Games Design, Ma Graphic Design, and the MA in Children’s Book Illustration, covering as they do, many of the areas associated with the definition, manifestation, and presentation of a toy or play product. Additionally students might also call on expertise from outside the Design School, such as the work being undertaken by the Child Computer Interaction group (ChiCi) in the Faculty of Science and Technology.

A student defined placement in the second practice module allows the student to further explore areas of relevance to their studies, either through arranged placement, collaborative activity or research visit.

Course Content

The student is supported by staff input through a series of design activities during Design Practice 1 that are designed to identify an area of interest that can then be fully explored through the following practice modules. Central to the programme is the learning agreement which is drawn up during the beginning of your studies – this forms the backbone of the postgraduate activity and provides a term of reference for assessable outcomes. Another important element of this course is that of ‘Reflective Practice’ where academic and theoretical issues arise out of Practice itself and students are expected to reflect on their design work through a written reflective journal. Complementary to the Design practice modules are two research modules that provide theoretical underpinning, one studied in semester 1 and the other in semester 2 (for both full time and part time mode).

Advanced Practice 2 provides the opportunity to explore issues through a student led dynamic research experience. Through a series of self arranged visits, the student will undertake further exploration within the commercial production context of toy design and manufacture.

The final semester of studies provides the student with the opportunity to bring together all that has been developed and researched through the preceding two semesters of study. A final major design activity and dissertation are undertaken and presented at the final public exhibition.

Interaction Design is concerned with communication through planned interaction, mediated through a variety of digital genres and technologies.

Fusing object spaces, imagery and sound, underpinned with contemporary theory, the course raises awareness and encourages debate of the cultural and theoretical issues of the discipline.

From visual design to technical implementation, you will learn to think creatively and strategically, not simply in reaction to a corporate imperative, but in response to an evolving and highly versatile medium.
Course Structure and Content

The course is offered in both full and part-time modes. It is normally one year, (three trimesters) in duration in full time mode or six trimesters in part-time mode. Online support for Part 3, the MA, is available.

The first two parts of the course are taught sessions and projects, while the MA is by negotiated project and dissertation only. Completion of the first two modules leads to the award of the Postgraduate Certificate, and completion of the first four modules leads to the award of the Postgraduate Diploma. Subsequent completion of the MA double module leads to the award of MA Design: Interaction Design. Since 1996 interaction design has been successfully taught at MA level at Bath Spa. The restructuring of the MA Design: Interaction Design course maintains its relevancy to the changes in contemporary practise.
Teaching Methods and Resources

Interaction Design is rapidly changing area of study. New services and technologies have immediate impact on individuals and society as a whole. The course enhances your design skills in envisioning, creating, prototyping and evaluating new ideas in this changing field.

A mixture of group and individual project work, taught technical demonstrations sessions and a weekly programme of external lectures will broaden your understanding and your abilities.

The course is supported by the School’s Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning, which gives access to a range of industry standard software including HD Video equipment for filming and editing, a dedicated video studio with sound recording, 3D modelling and a full range of graphic and web authoring tools.

Course material is available through the University’s Virtual Learning Environment system and can easily be accessed on or off site.

The modules available deal with:
Research Methodologies;
Communication and Representation;
Narrative and Location;
Objects and Spaces: Invisible Computing.

You will choose one of these specialist routes, but students from all courses will explore together common principles in the philosophy and approach to design. You will then focus on the diversity and individuality of your particular design specialism.
Course Structure and Content

The course is offered in both full and part-time modes. It is normally one calendar year (three trimesters) in duration in full-time mode, or six trimesters in part-time mode (this may be extended by negotiation).

The course is in three parts:
The Postgraduate Certificate (PGCert) in trimester 1;
The Postgraduate Diploma (PGDip) in trimester 2;
Master of Arts (MA) in trimester 3.

During the first two trimesters full-time students are taught two days a week, with another two days work expected of them, while part-time students are taught one day a week with another day of self-study. All teaching is supported by email and you will have a personal tutor and ready access to the course director.

For full-time students, trimesters 1 and 2 involve four modules leading to the PGDip. All students take a common module, Research Methodologies, in the first trimester. At the same time you will undertake the first module of your chosen design discipline (see below) in Trimester 1, followed by two further specialist modules in Trimester 2. Finally an individually negotiated study forming a body of work, in Trimester 3, completes the MA.
Teaching Methods and Resources

Specialist facilities include computer studios with over 70 Macs, as well as flatbed and transparency scanners. Ceramics students have workspaces in well equipped workshops, including CAD facilities. There is an excellent glaze laboratory and a range of electric and gas-fired kilns, including outdoor firing facilities for salt and raku. There is also a dedicated space and kilns for large- scale work. Fashion and Textiles students benefit from specialist studio spaces for printing, knitting, weaving, and embroidery/stitch, using the latest digital technology for 3D design. Interaction Design students will benefit from a recently re-equipped digital media studio. All students have access to workshops in photography, sound and video, etching and litho, as well as the specialist Art and Design library.