Enhancing your career prospects

Office workers.

Thinking about your future career?

Developing skills that will make you attractive to employers and that will give you a head start when looking for work is about extending the skills that you already have, making contacts, broadening your ideas, and understanding how to gain and use your experiences to enhance your future prospects. 

Our modules are designed around the current needs of employers and the legal and criminal justice professions, and we place great emphasis on the development of your professional skills. We also work with the Aberystwyth University Careers Service to ensure that all our students get the careers advice they need.

Our dedicated Careers Consultant for the Department of Law & Criminology is Tony Orme. He delivers lectures, workshops, events, individual consultations and interactive group sessions to ensure that all students benefit from careers education, information and guidance support.

He is also responsible for all aspects of helping students, graduates and staff interested in enterprise and new business start-up to turn their good ideas into great businesses.

E-mail: awo@aber.ac.uk
Telephone: (01970) 622378

Becoming involved in extra-curricular activities like societies, volunteering and work experience during your studies is a good way to show employers that you have a proactive attitude. We encourage all our students to try to make the most of their time with us. To help you, we have put together some useful information. Click on each of the tabs to find out more.

Volunteering

Volunteering and gaining work experience can be a significant part of your journey both during and after your studies. Having the opportunity to apply what you learn during your degree in a practical and meaningful way will make you a stronger and more well-rounded candidate when applying for jobs.

Please see below a list of the organisations that offer volunteering opportunities to our students and that we work with on a regular basis. You will also find a live feed from our Facebook page where we advertise many of our opportunities for current students and our graduates.

Organisation

Contact Name

Contact email

HomeStart

Avril Gatland

avrilhomestartceredigion@gmail.com

Youth Justice and Prevention Services

Tallulah Moonlight

tallulah.moonlight@ceredigion.gov.uk

Dyfed Powis Police

Adele Jones, Citizen in Policing Co-ordinator

adele.jones@dyfed-powys.pnn.police.uk

Hafal (Aberystwyth)

Ruth Wilson, Service Manager

ruth.wilson@hafal.org

MIND

Tim Bennett, Business Manager

tim@mindaberystwyth.org

CAVO

Ruth Evans, Volunteer Enabler

ruth.evans@cavo.org.uk

CAB Ceredigion

Philip Gibson

philip.gibson@citizenadvice.org.uk /

manager@aberystwyth.cabnet.org.uk

Police and Crime Commissioner

 

opcc@dyfed-powys.pnn.police.uk

OPCC Independent Custody Visitors

 

opcc@dyfed-powys.pnn.police.uk

OPCC Animal Welfare Visitors

 

opcc@dyfed-powys.pnn.police.uk

Volunteering Wales

 

help@wcva.cymru

Work Placements

Here in the Department of Law and Criminology, we offer three forms of placements while you study your undergraduate degree. We know how difficult it can be to gain the correct experience needed to get jobs, and that's where placement modules come in. These modules, such as Employability Skills for Professionals and the Criminal Justice Placement help you to gain that experience and skill set that employers look for while allowing you to gain credits towards your degee.

Other benefits of completing a work-based placement module include:

  1. providing an opportunity to apply theory to practice
  2. improving your self-confidence and sense of responsibility
  3. enhancing your CV with experiential learning and experience
  4. exploring different career areas
  5. readying you for the workplace by identifying your strengths and developing transferable skills
  6. providing opportunities to network and develop key contacts in established organisations that may support you in your future career.

Through our links we have placements available at many well known organisations. This is an opportunity to enhance your job prospects by developing skills and experience in the workplace that complement the knowledge acquired from your degree programme.

Student Societies

Aberystwyth University Law Society

The Aberystwyth University Law Society (AULS) is an active part of the Department of Law and Criminology which organises trips to courts and law fairs, talks, book sales, social evenings as well as the high point of the calendar, which is the annual Law Ball.

Aberystwyth University Criminology Society

The Criminology Society is another important part of departmental life with a varied programme of crime movie nights, prison visits and study support sessions before exam periods.

Aberystwyth Law & Criminology Journal

The Aberystwyth Law & Criminology Journal is an exciting initiative which aims to provide a platform for displaying the highest quality work produced by students. It is an opportunity to publish your academic writing, especially if you have completed a substantial piece of research such as a dissertation. The Journal also commemorates a former student of the department, Ern Nian Yaw, by awarding an annual award in his memory. Ern Nian was a student who helped to launch the journal, but who was killed before the first issue of the journal was published. The prize is awarded to the author of the article that demonstrates the very qualities possessed by Ern: outstanding academic ability, fantastic work ethic, and an eye for detail. To find out more, please visit our website.

Career options

With a law degree, there will be many paths open to you in areas such as:

  • citizens advice
  • finance
  • HMRC
  • immigration
  • local government
  • paralegal work
  • political research
  • providing legal advice (as a solicitor or barrister)
  • the civil service.

With a Criminology degree, there will be opportunities for you in the following areas:

  • HMRC
  • policy work
  • the Police
  • the prison service
  • the probation service
  • research
  • youth support.