Theatre Studies and Arts Management with Foundation Year BA (Hons)

Birkbeck, University of London

Do you want to tell, produce and facilitate stories on stage? Are you equally interested in the business of the arts and what happens backstage? Are you keen to study in central London, at the heart of the city’s vibrant theatre and literary culture?

If so, our new BA Theatre Studies and Arts Management with Foundation Year is ideal. You will study with leading academics, theatremakers and professionals working within the creative industries in a building that was once home to Virginia Woolf and the Bloomsbury Group. You will investigate theatre and arts management in a range of contexts. You will study theatre and performance from the perspective of the spectator and the practitioner learning about the different ways in which theatre impacts culture and society.

You will gain a crucial understanding of:

• how creative organisations work

• how cultural policy is implemented

• the role of audience development and curatorial practice across cultural contexts.

Throughout, you will engage deeply with live performance and learn from leading practitioners in your field.

Before proceeding to the main degree, you will spend your Foundation Year preparing yourself for a degree in the arts by improving your study and research skills and gaining arts-related knowledge and understanding. You will also have the opportunity to take a language module as part of the Foundation Year.

Upon successful completion of the Foundation Year, you can automatically progress on to our three-year, full-time, evening study BA Theatre Studies and Arts Management.

Our part-time Foundation Year degrees allow you to spread out your Foundation Year studies over two years. As the 'Foundation Year' is made up of 120 credits, as a part-time student you can take 60 credits in each of your first and second years before starting the main four-year BA Theatre Studies and Arts Management. This means that you can take six years to complete the part-time degree with Foundation Year.

Highlights

• Our Foundation Year programmes will fully prepare you for undergraduate study. They are ideal if you are returning to study after a gap, if you have not previously studied the relevant subjects, or if you did not achieve the grades you needed for a place on your chosen undergraduate degree.

• Birkbeck is located in the heart of literary London - in Bloomsbury, WC1 - and writers and academics maintain strong links with the creative industries. You could be studying in a building that was once home to Virginia Woolf and frequented by members of the Bloomsbury Group - now home to our School of Arts - and be taught by leading dramatists, artists and arts managers. The building houses our own creative hub which includes the Peltz Gallery, the Gordon Square Cinema and a theatre and performance space.

• You will be eligible to submit work to the Scratch Night as part of Birkbeck Arts Week, and to attend public events and performances curated by Birkbeck Centre for Contemporary Theatre.

• In the most recent Research Excellence Framework (REF), English Language and Literature at Birkbeck achieved 100% for a research environment conducive to producing research of the highest quality.

• The School of Arts is an official partner of the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) in London. Opportunities for students have included a year’s free membership of the ICA, private views, discounts on all talks and events, free members' screenings and £3 cinema tickets on Tuesdays, up to 25% off ICA Artists' Editions and a monthly e-newsletter.