Increase your employment opportunities
A placement year degree (also known as a sandwich degree) is a chance to apply the skills you learn on your course in the workplace, and to increase your employability when you graduate.
Most employers prefer to hire graduates who have professional work experience alongside their studies, so choosing a placement year helps to put you ahead in the job market. Many of our students are hired by their placement employer after graduation.
You don't have to work for a company during your placement year — if you have a business idea, you can choose a self-employed placement year to start your own business.
What is a placement (or sandwich) year degree?
Placement year degrees are an opportunity to apply your degree learning by working for a year in industry before you graduate.
Your placement usually takes place before the final year of your degree, so this is also known as a sandwich year placement. At Portsmouth, you can complete your placement before or after your final study year.
You'll spend your placement year working for an employer or setting up your own business, and experience what it's like to work in your potential career.
Benefits of doing a placement year degree
- Increases your employment opportunities and confidence
- Develops your understanding of the national and international business environment
- Develops your transferable and interpersonal skills like team-working, communication, problem-solving and commercial awareness
- Gives you a better understanding of your degree, helping you choose your modules and dissertation project in your final year of study
- Helps you build a valuable professional network and meet new friends, including potential career mentors
- Exposes you to exciting new experiences – especially if you choose to live in another city or country
- Gives you experience of your chosen industry so you can make informed decisions about your future career path
For students seeking a placement I would say to absolutely do it, there is no wasted experience. Do everything you could possibly do and step out of your comfort zone, you will learn a lot about yourself.
What can I do on my placement year?
Your placement year needs to relate to your degree — but what you do is up to you.
Connected Degrees®: 3 year course with 4th year placement
From September 2024, you can choose to carry out your placement after your final year.
Overseas placement years
On some of our courses, you can do your placement year abroad. Our students have travelled to countries including Japan, Belgium, Ireland, Switzerland, Malaysia, America and Spain during their sandwich year.
Self-employed placement years
If you choose to start up a business during a self-employed placement year, you'll be doing it in the UK's most entrepreneurial city 2020 (Instant Offices) and we'll give you .
Undertaking a placement year enabled me to gain work experience and increase my employability whilst still a student.
Heading abroad not only gave me the opportunity to travel halfway around the world to learn a second language but also to engage and immerse myself in the local culture and communities, an experience I could only dream about from Portsmouth.
The placement process
Finding a placement
Our Placement Officers can help you find a suitable placement, or help you prepare for a self-employed placement year. We have links with many organisations and companies from various industries.
On some courses, like health and care professions courses, your course team chooses your placement for you to ensure you get appropriate experiences to meet your degree needs.
Funding your placement year
You'll pay a discounted tuition fee to the University while you're on placement, and need to consider your living costs and how you'll support yourself financially.
The cost of your sandwich year placement, and any funding you're eligible for, depends on the type and location of your placement.
Placement assessments
Your placement year will be assessed by a portfolio of evidence.
Your portfolio could include a placement diary, a reflective analysis of your your personal development, a reference from your placement provider, among other items.
This assessment doesn't apply if you take a language year abroad.
We'll help you find the best placement for your studies, and connect you with businesses who partner with us like multinational pharmaceutical companies, national health trusts, national sports clubs and schools across the UK.
Optional placements
Optional work placements are periods of time spent in employment with organisations in the private, public or third sectors. Optional work placements differ from mandatory placements which are a compulsory element of the learning experience within professional courses e.g. teaching, nursing and social work. Connected Degrees give students the choice to take an optional work placement either as a traditional sandwich year (between your second and third year of studies) or, if they prefer, after their course.
It's important for students to be aware that many placement roles are aimed specifically at students in their penultimate year of study. So, students are strongly advised to seek early advice from the placement team to avoid missing opportunities that might only be available as a sandwich placement.
Placements typically last from 9-12 months and, for international students due to current UKVI legislation, placements must be completed by the course end date. All placements are subject to an approval process and students should speak with the Placements Team for more information on any requirements to approve a placement role
They have a number of potential benefits, including:
- The opportunity for placement students to bring technical and subject knowledge into their final year
- Improved academic performance, with sandwich placements on average improving final degree classifications by up to half a degree classification
- Potential for placement students to be invited back after graduation, for a graduate role as many graduate recruiters actively seek placement students as a part of their hiring strategies
- The opportunity for placement students to use their final year to apply for jobs, with an enhanced CV
- Improved job prospects, with placement students 15% more likely to gain professional employment than other students
- Enhanced salary on graduation
Taking an optional work placement at the end of your degree course has a number of potential benefits, including:
- Extra time for students to evaluate their options and explore a new career path
- The possibility of being offered ongoing employment after an optional work placement, and to progress straight into a job
- An opportunity to put into practice three or four years of learning
- The opportunity for graduates to try out an employer or sector without a long-term commitment
Whether you choose to pursue an optional work placement as a sandwich option, or at the end of your course, optional work placements are not guaranteed. It is the responsibility of students to apply for and secure an optional work placement, with support from the University.
All optional work placements remain subject to approval by the University using its standard process and in line with the
Considering our fourth year placement option?
The option to take your placement at the end of your studies makes ºÚÁϳԹÏthe only university where you can:
- Spend an extra year thinking about your future career path
- Explore options for placements in more depth
- Take more time to develop skills for the workplace
- Continue your studies without a break, and still get the benefits of taking a placement year
- Stay with your friends throughout your course, before going on placement
- Connect your placement more closely to the modules you choose
- Receive an extra year of support from the University before starting your career
It's your choice
Each year, around 20-30 Home Students choose to undertake a Self-Employed Placement during their course, in which they are supported to start their own business. Students opting for a Self-Employed Placement (or SEP) are given advice and support throughout their placement year, including access to office space on campus from which to operate. This option is not available to students as a Connected Degree after graduation, although UK graduates can still access ongoing advice and support to start businesses.
International students are not permitted to undertake Self-Employed Placements either during or after their course, as their Student Visa, or Home Office legislation, do not allow them to engage in business activities including starting a business.
Every home and international undergraduate student starting an undergraduate course from September 2024 is able to undertake an optional work placement at the end of their course, with specific rules for international students under Home Office legislation. The option is not available to postgraduate students. International students on a visa must seek advice from the international student advice team on visa extensions and registration dates when considering their options.
Home students who choose to take an optional work placement after their course will graduate with their cohort at the end of their final year of study.
Due to Home Office regulations, international students who secure an optional work placement after their course, will graduate after completing their placement and assessment. This will be a year after their undergraduate course finishes.
You will receive the same award whether or not you complete a placement. If you secure a placement offer, and complete and pass the placement year, there will be an acknowledgement on your degree transcript to show that you completed the placement year.
Students can choose to work or study abroad as a sandwich year and then take a post-study work placement.
However, students cannot take a study abroad year at the end of their course, and they cannot take two work placements.
Optional work placements, during or after your course, can have a lot of benefits. However, not every student can, or will want to, do an optional work placement. There are other opportunities at the University, within and outside of our courses, for students to gain valuable work or voluntary experience.
These include opportunities available through the Students' Union, such as being a Course Rep or taking on a leadership role in one of our many clubs and societies, and volunteering with a local organisation through the Careers and Employability Service. Students gaining additional experiences like these can gain recognition through our ºÚÁϳԹÏAward, which can be added to your CV or LinkedIn profile.
If you want to increase your work experience, but an optional work placement isn't for you, visit our Careers and Employability Service for advice.
Supporting you
The Careers and Employability Service work very closely with students to support them with their placement search by providing tips on how to search for roles, providing 1-2-1 CV and application feedback, interview preparation, and more. We also run a weekly Placement Club in the Careers and Employability Service, faculty placement events, drop in and bookable appointments available each day, that students can book to discuss their placement search, and placement sessions included in our undergraduate and postgraduate courses.
Whether you choose to do your optional work placement during or after your undergraduate course, you will get support with:
- Searching and applying for suitable roles
- Writing applications and preparing for interviews
- Navigating competitive recruitment processes
- Deciding the right time for them to do a placement
- Access to ongoing support from the University during the placement
- Students choosing an optional sandwich placement will also benefit from placement preparation sessions embedded into our taught courses
For the avoidance of doubt, the responsibility is on the student to search for, and secure, a placement offer within the deadlines set out in our university-wide approval process. The University does not match students to placements and the selection processes are managed by employers/placement providers. Placements can take place between the 2nd and 3rd year of studies, or after the final year of studies under the Connected Degree option. The placement opportunities are advertised and the students apply directly to employers as part of a competitive process. The number of placements available varies year on year, depending on the labour market in the sector the student wishes to go in. We support students through their placement search, and advertise a range of placement opportunities with employers. Students can also search for opportunities through external websites (e.g. Rate My Placement or Target Jobs or Gradcracker, etc.) and make their own speculative applications.
Students can apply for placements advertised by us on our jobs board, or they can identify their own. Either way, once an offer is in place, the placement MUST be approved by the Placement Team who will carry out further checks (in line with our approval process and optional placements policy) to ensure the placement is suitable, and establish an agreement with the placement provider to manage the relationship.
Home students will pay a reduced tuition fee to undertake a sandwich placement, currently set at 15% of the full tuition fee for each year. There is currently no fee for home students to undertake an optional work placement after their course.
International students will pay 15% of their tuition fee for their placement year, regardless of whether this is taken as a sandwich placement or after their course.
Home students choosing an optional work placement as a sandwich year may be eligible for a tuition fee and reduced maintenance loan. They should contact the University’s Student Finance Team for detailed individual advice but, in broad terms, the maintenance loan for the placement year is based on the placement location, salary, and residence (i.e. whether living at home or elsewhere).
Optional work placements taken after our undergraduate degree courses are not eligible for Student Finance support under current rules.
Students who plan to take their placement as a sandwich must communicate notice of the accepted placement offer by the end of July in their second year of study.
Students who plan to take their placement at the end of their degree, must communicate notice of the accepted placement offer by mid-February in the final year of their studies.
We anticipate that the majority of optional placements students will continue to take their placement between second and third year. However, some students will feel that the end of courset option is more suitable for them. This is important for students to seek advice early from our placement team to ensure they are supported to make the right choice for them, taking into account their career aspirations and the sectors they are hoping to work in. This is important because the early career structures in some industries are still built around the ‘sandwich’ placement so students will need to plan to take their placement at that point if they wish to secure a placement within those industries.
Decisions to take a placement are usually made early in your second or third year – depending on when you choose to take your placement. Careers and Employability can help you decide before you start looking for opportunities.Once you've decided, our Careers and Employability Team will support you through the recruitment process as you search and apply for placements.
All students undertaking an optional work placement will be required to undertake a pass/fail assessment. Details of this assessment, including submission deadlines, will be communicated to students before starting their placement.
Placements from previous students
You can work in many different placement roles across a wide range of sectors, whatever your subject.
If you already know what you want to study, you can find specific placement information on your course page.
Previous placement students have completed placement years in areas like project management, engineering, photography, audiobook publishing, forensic accounting, and more.
Our students have an impact too. One fashion intern at FatFace had her design sold on the high street, while another one of our students was a runner on a film starring Michael Caine, and one students worked at Paris Fashion Week while on placement with Paul Smith.
Placement degrees
Find out about some specific placements you could choose for your subject on your course page.
Placement roles
Our students have completed placements as roles including:
- Environmental management assistant
- Graphic designer
- HR assistant
- Interior design intern
- Junior aerospace engineer
- Junior developer
- Performance analyst assistant
- Photographer
- Quality inspector
- Restorative justice administrator
- Systems engineer
- Victim support caseworker
Placement companies
Our previous students have done placements at companies including:
- – a provider of all services to those affected by domestic abuse
Placement stories
Placement Experience: Creative Intern at the Walt Disney Company - Corey White
Find out about Corey White BA (Hons) Film Production student on placement as a Creative Intern with the Walt Disney Company
Jamie Legg - This experience allowed me to utilise the technical, planning, and interpersonal skills developed throughout my studies.
Jamie turned his love of practical learning into a successful placement year, which opened up great career opportunities.
Placement Experience: DreamWorks Marketing Intern at NBC Universal
"The University resources helped me to secure my placement through guidance of applications and interviews."
Self employed placement experience: BA (Hons) Photography - Eliska Svrlanska
Find out about Eliska Svrlanska BA (Hons) Photography student reflecting on her Self Employed year placement
What's it like to take a placement year?
Hear from some of our placement year students - Finlay, who took a placement at NBC Universal, Anastasia, who found a place at St Vincent College, and Charley, who took a role at Castle View Academy.
Find out about their experiences and hear what advice they have to give other students.
Finlay: I've loved every moment of my placement. It's probably one of the most fantastic years I've ever done in my life, probably one of the best things I've ever done.
Emily Parry: The school covers area studies, sociology, history, politics and literature. There are a number of different placement opportunities that are based locally or nationally around the UK, covering lots of different sectors and areas. So there's something there for everybody.
Finlay: Before university, I was always somebody that really didn't want to rush university. I wanted to try a placement year out, which was something that I'd love to do, and here we are today at NBC Universal. I got very, very lucky with it, but it's great.
Emily Parry: One of the misconceptions about placements and work experience for humanities students is that it would be very restricted on the kind of things that they can do.
Finlay: As a politics student, obviously I do love politics, but it's the other interests you have outside of politics. I love my films, I love my TV series, so I work in an environment selling content that I love.
Anastasia: Since about year ten, I knew I wanted to be a teacher. The work placement has definitely put it in perspective that it’s still what I want to do and it means that I don't have to go into a PGCE placement completely unaware of what I have to do. It gives me the experience of what a teacher actually needs to do and what their role is in a college.
Charley: Teaching is something I find quite natural to do. It wasn't really to do with my degree, but I found it was quite easy to interlink the two. So I was able to run a politics club here and it was really quite inspiring to see how enlightened the students were and how knowledgeable they were about current day events, and went from there, really.
Emily Parry: What I love about placements is seeing the students when they come back and you can see the development in them of the confidence that they've built and their ability to communicate and work as part of a team.
Charley: Before, I really struggled with public speaking. So standing in front of an audience is not something I would initially choose to do, and for some people, standing in front of 30 children is even more scary than standing in front of adults.
Finlay: ºÚÁÏ³Ô¹Ï really helped me with confidence and the ability to speak, which I've then brought into NBCU where I present in front of my managers once a month.
Charley: Having that sort of exposure was really, really important to me. For students who want to do a placement, I would just say go for it.
Anastasia: It’s a brilliant opportunity to put yourself in a workplace environment with loads and loads of support.
Finlay: Just put everything into it because it really is a year that's really helped me feel a lot more confident going into my final year of university.
Emily Parry: It's the best feeling when a student gets that placement because you know the opportunities that's going to open up for them with their future career.
Megan Cato: My placement was life-changing
Specialist subjects, stand-out modules and engaging lectures - see why Megan loved her life-changing course.
Browse our courses
Are you ready to increase your employment opportunities and strengthen your skills by doing a sandwich year degree? Browse our placement degree courses now.
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