UCL Geography Undergraduate Open Days

From 2021 applicants do not need to have an A level or IB qualification in Geography and we do not expect students to have any prior knowledge of the subject, though clearly many will. The first-year curriculum is designed to provide students with a suitable introduction to geography whichever syllabus they have studied.

Single Honours students have to take five compulsory modules in the first year. Four cover topics from across human and physicalgeography and the fifth, Understanding Our Planet, is a physical geography module. You may choose human or physical modules after that and may take an ancillary outside the Department. After the first year it is up to you what kinds of topics you choose to do. Economics and Geography students are not restricted to human geography modules. BA Geography with Social Data Science are restricted to human geography modules until the final year.

The modules you choose do not determine whether you graduate with a BA or BSc, and it is easy to switch from one programme to the other.

Single Honours students can take an ancillary module up to a maximum of 15 credits from outside the Geography department; please consult the UCL Module Catalogue for details on which modules are available. This module must be at an appropriate level.

Some of the other programmes combine modules from several disciplines. However, BSc (Econ) Economics and Geography students are not normally permitted to take an ancillary module outside of Economics and Geography without permission from the joint degree tutor.

UCL guarantees an accommodation place for all full-time single, first-year undergraduate students studying at UCL for the first time and single, international first-year postgraduate students subject to the eligibility criteria. Your normal home address makes no difference to these criteria.

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Access UCL is UCL's alternative offer scheme for students from groups that are underrepresented at UCL. Eligible students who successfully complete the Access UCL scheme will receive a reduced offer of up to two grades below the standard UCL offer for the programme they have applied for.

Read our eligibility requirements

In some years not all of our applicants get the grades they need to fulfil their offer conditions and we then have a few spare places. We look at 'near miss' students who have marginally failed to meet their offer – dropping a grade for instance – and might then contact them to offer them a place. That ensures we take the number of students we’re hoping for. This can’t be guaranteed, though, because of the way UCAS works, and in the exceptional circumstances of the summer of 2020, we were unable to take applicants who had missed their grades.

If your grades match the requirements for one of our other programmes, then you may be able to transfer if there is a place free and the request is made at the very start of your first year – usually by mid-October.

It varies, but eight to twelve contact hours per week is fairly typical – this might include lectures, seminars, tutorials, lab work, fieldwork, etc. But we expect students to spend three hours preparing, reading and taking notes for each of these hours, and there are also essays to write and practical work to do. You may well end up working a thirty-five-hour week.

The first-year field class is compulsory for students in all of our programmes as it is part of the core module Geography in the Field 1.  BSc Economics and Geography students can take part in this field class if they wish. Second and final-year field classes are optional modules like our other courses, so you must choose to take them.

We are committed to keeping extra costs for fieldwork to an absolute minimum, as we believe it is a core aspect of the discipline and doesn’t want to exclude students for financial reasons. In normal years UCL Geography covers travel costs from Gatwick Airport and accommodation for the first year fieldtrip to Catalonia and pays for all meals (except on one evening when you are free to eat out in Barcelona). The Department also currently makes a significant contribution to the costs of second and third-year fieldtrips, paying for travel (from London), accommodation, and breakfast. Of course, the exact cost of each fieldtrip will vary, and we certainly cannot be sure what will happen once we can travel again, but this is our current policy. We want to make sure that no one is prevented from joining a field class because of its cost. In fact, some students attend two or even three field trips over the course of their studies.

Laboratory-based teaching rarely presents us with any issues. However, after the first-year field class, which is compulsory for most students, the number of students who can attend an individual field trip is capped.

Most of our modules do not have strict prerequisites. Please consult the list of modules offered by the department on the UCL module catalogue (level 5 for second-year modules, level 6 for final-year modules).

Joint degree students may attend the first-year field class by choosing to take GEOG0013 Geography in the Field 1.

Joint degree students do not normally take dissertation modules, but exceptions may be made if a reasonable case is made at the start of the second year.  Students wishing to write a 45-credit final-year dissertation must take GEOG0016: The Practice of Geography and GEOG0018: Methods in Human Geography in the second year, plus two other 15-credit options from the second-year Geography options.

Yes. Students in the three-year BA/BSc programme may, with the agreement of both the Undergraduate and International Degree Tutors, transfer onto the International Program. Any application for a transfer must be lodged by the second week of term 1, year 2.

However, students who fail to achieve a year one average of 60% or above will be transferred to the three-year programme without a year or term abroad. You may also choose to transfer in this way at any time before you choose your destinations.

BA/BSc Geography and Economics and Geography students on the International (Year Abroad) programmes and three-year programme students taking a term abroad select three destinations they would like to study in. UCL then finds applicants a place at one of those institutions in most cases. Some universities are harder to get into than others because they are more popular, teach in the language of the country, or offer modules taught in English. Those students with the highest first-year marks tend to have an advantage, too.

These change from year to year, and at present Brexit and the Coronavirus pandemic make it hard to be certain about the destinations that would be offered to you. The list of destinations students could choose from in 2020-21 can be seen on the Study Abroad website, though – click on the relevant programme to see which partner universities are available. UCL’s Study Abroad team will provide up-to-date advice to students on these programmes.

UCL Careers provides advice and training for students throughout their time at UCL. The Department’s Careers and Academic Support Tutor provides a link with UCL Careers, and additional talks and events are organised.

All kinds. Geography is a broad subject and students graduate with a wide set of skills and interests. The latest figures show the six most popular sectors for our graduates are: finance; policy and government; retail; publishing; hospitality and tourism; IT and technology. More than half of our graduates are working in those sectors six months after leaving UCL.

However, nearly a quarter of our students go into postgraduate education immediately after graduating, including Masters programmes, conversion courses for Law, and other professional training.

Placements and internships are not a formal part of our programmes, but they can be organised to fit in with your studies and we can assist with that.

The Department’s laboratories are in the North-West Wing. We also have a Map Library and Reading Room in Bedford Way, providing supplementary library facilities, computers, and space to work as well as an extensive map collection. Informal study spaces are available in both buildings, including a new common room in the North-West Wing.

Normally students get to know each other at a welcome event organised by our student-run UCL Geography Society on the weekend before induction week. Almost everyone attends the first-year field class five weeks later, which is a fantastic opportunity to meet and work with your peers. We also have our own spaces for socialising and working. Our keen and enthusiastic students organise all kinds of activities and events, including their own journal. Much of UCL is contained in a surprisingly compact space – it can feel like a campus university even though you’re in the heart of a world city.