BSc Navigation and Maritime Science
Navigation and Maritime Science (NMS) feeds graduates to the shipping industry as qualified deck officers, skippers to the professional yachting and racing industries and personnel to the shore based ship-management and support industries.
We are accredited by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) and the Merchant Navy Training Board (MNTB). In order to achieve deck officer status the modules this must be passed with a minimum average pass of 50% and a minimum of 65% in certain safety critical assessments. In addition a minimum 12 month period at sea, part of which is achieved via a placement year, must be undertaken along with about £8k of professional short courses delivered here or organised by the lecturing staff through external providers
Companies typically sponsor students to achieve this although we have developed a mixed mode of sponsorship (where students take loans for the course fees component) to enable us to be commercially competitive
As you would expect there is a lot of industry interaction required to achieve this and the following brief list summarises some of the headline activities required to achieve this:
1)Regular staff representation and engagement at the MNTB and IAMI (international Association of Maritime Institutions). Regular contact and engagement with the MCA.
2)Staff engage in regular company liaison including attendance of AGM and training seminars.
3)Organisation of company visits and hosting here at UoP for interview
4)Associated preparation of students. Through building in sessions from employability into a stage 1 module (particularly CV and application letter writing) and reviewing said documents on request.
5)All students encouraged to join either the Royal Institute of Navigation or Nautical institute. Staff member take active roles in local branches and will introduce student members to external professionals for networking at branch meetings
6)Helping (annually) the students host an evening session for British Marine (BM) in our labs followed by reciprocal visits to the London boat show (funded by BM) where VIP facilities are used to enable each student to meet with representatives of the sector of industry in which they have demonstrated and interest.
7)Helping the students host and deliver a final stage conference (also an assessment) at which industrial representation is present and networking opportunities exist
8)Organisation of a twilight visiting speakers programme running throughout the academic year at which all stages on our programmes are invited to give cross-stage support and to allow various industrial sectors to present meet and discuss the industry with our students.
9)Regular forwarding of industrial opportunities to students via email with advice.
10)Industrial visits built in to the programme (some of which are hosted by former students).
11)Provision of, staffing and assessment of professional short courses including preparation for professional examinations.
12)Management of outsourced courses run through 3rd party providers.