Academic Partnerships

Plymouth University

Academic Partnerships

CORNWALL COLLEGE, Camborne

Programme Quality Handbook

BA (HONS) BUSINESS ENTERPRISE (Top up)

Academic Year 2016-2017

If you require any part of this Handbook in larger print, or an alternative format, please contact:

HE Operations

Tel: (01209 616256)

E-mail: ()

Please note:

All the information in this Handbook is correct at the time of printing.

The Cornwall College Group is proud of its teaching and research and it undertakes all reasonable steps to provide educational services in the manner set out in this Handbook and in any documents referred to within it. It does not, however, guarantee the provision of such services. Should industrial action or circumstances beyond the control of the College interfere with its ability to provide educational services, the University undertakes to use all reasonable steps to minimise the resultant disruption to those services.

Contents

1 Welcome and Introduction to…….. 4

2 Programme Team 4

3 Personal Tutor 5

3.1 Plymouth Portal 5

4 Programme Details 7

4.1 Enhancement Activities 7

4.2 Progression through the programme 7

4.3 HE Careers Guidance – Cornwall College 8

4.4 HE Careers Guidance – Plymouth University 8

5 Employment Opportunities 8

6 Teaching, Learning and Assessment 9

6.1 Referencing Guides 9

7 Assessment Schedules and Feedback 10

8 Student Feedback 13

8.1 Student Representation and Enhancement 13

8.2 Student Perception Surveys 13

8.3 Closing the Feedback Loop 14

8.4 Programme Committee Meetings (PCM) 14

8.5 Complaints 15

8.6 Extenuating Circumstances 15

9 Appendix 17

9.1 Programme Specification – to be the latest version associated with the programme 17

1 Welcome and Introduction to BA (Hons) Business Enterprise (Top-Up)

May we begin by warmly welcoming you to the BA (Hons) Business Enterprise Management (Top-Up). The College is delighted that you have chosen to study with us. We are sure you are going to have a great time here and will get a great deal from the programme.

The course replaces the FdA which in turn replaced the HND in Business at Cornwall College, which was established in September 1991. Our graduates are now employed in a wide range of occupations, including retail management, marketing, management consultancy, business development management, accountancy, teaching, the police, financial services, hotel management, banking, systems analysis and academic research.

We normally expect to recruit about 20 to 30 students to the course. Many of these are from the surrounding area, with most being aged 18 or 19 when they start. We have some students from further afield, however, and over the years have enrolled students from Poland, Lithuania, USA, Hong Kong, Ireland, Nepal, Gambia, Germany, Greece, amongst others. We also recruit a number of mature students, including people returning to paid employment after a period of absence, people leaving the armed forces, plus people who would like to improve their employability with a higher qualification. There is an almost equal split of male and female students.

The programme is approved by Plymouth University, and students are registered as members of the Plymouth University Academic Partnerships Faculty. This programme has been designed to equip you with the skills and knowledge base required to work in your chosen specialism or other graduate opportunities. It is also a platform from which you can undertake additional vocational and academic qualifications.

2 Programme Team

Programme Leader: Dr Bryan Mills

What does your programme leader do? Bryan organises, teaches and completes all of the quality assurance paperwork associated with your programme. Bryan has extensive experience of both teaching, tutoring and coordinating Higher Education courses and the associated administrative processes.

Module Leaders:

Dr Roger Clough / Accountancy and Business Strategy Lecturer /
Sandie Johns / Law Lecturer /
Warren Evans / PDL/HR|M Lecturer /

CORPORATE HE ASSISTANT REGISTRAR: Katerina Gavrilova. What does the Corporate HE Assistant Registrar (CHEAR) do? The CHEAR is your point of contact in HE Operations for all administrative paperwork to do with the programme. He can be contacted on: Telephone: 01209 617757 or Ext 3757.

Email:

3 Personal Tutor

Your personal tutor should be the first person at the College that you speak to if you are having any personal difficulties that are affecting your studies. These could be academic, financial, health-related or another type of problem. Your personal tutor is there to provide additional academic and personal support concerning issues that may affect your studies. Personal Tutors are particularly important for students in their first year, helping them to manage the transition from school or the workplace to university-style life. Personal tutors also assist with helping you to engage with important aspects of preparation for your career and or progression to further study and profiling your progress through the programme.

Your main support for academic issues relating to specific modules will be the lecturer who is teaching that module. Your tutor will be the person who; if the College is asked, will write a personal reference for you during, or on completion of your studies.

Programme staff will communicate with students in the following ways:

· Email - staff will communicate with you via your college and/or university email. In order to maintain professionalism staff will NOT communicate with you directly using your personal email. If you do not wish to regularly check BOTH your College and Plymouth University emails you must ensure that these are forwarded to your personal email address.

· Text messaging – Under exceptional circumstances staff may contact you via text. Please ensure that your Programme Manager has your current mobile number.

· College/Institution intranet / virtual learning environment – For module level communications staff use the Moodle Site. Please make sure that you are enrolled onto all of your modules.

· HE Operations Moodle Pages – this site houses a vast array of information relevant to your time at the College.

· Plymouth University Student Portal (see section below)

· Programme Notice-Board

· HE bulletins

· Link to College/Institution campus map or details: https://www.cornwall.ac.uk/sites/default/files/documents/DCR%202012%203D%20Map.pdf

· Links to disability support teams: https://www.cornwall.ac.uk/university/support-during-your-degree

The university personal tutoring policy is available for information and guidance.

3.1 Plymouth Portal

As a Plymouth student you are able to access the University’s e-resources through the Plymouth portal (the University’s internal staff and student website).

There is access to over £2 million of e-resources and e-journals in a variety of different subject ranges which can be used to support your studies. An excellent library guide has been developed to help you access these resources off campus and this also links you to subject specific resources. This link takes you to the universities library guide homepage http://plymouth.libguides.com/partners.

In addition the University has created a Student Study File available at www.studywithplymouth.ac.uk which signposts you to a wealth of resources including UPSU (Plymouth Student Union), Study Skills Guides and using the portal.

You will automatically have a Plymouth University e-mail account accessed through myEdesk, E-mail, calendar, contacts, (OWA) structured as follows: . Your password will always be given in this format Dob.dd/mm/yyyy e.g Dob.10/07/1984. You can change your password once into the portal however please make sure it is something memorable as you will need it throughout your studies.

There are instructions located on the student study file on how to forward your University emails to your preferred email address to ensure you obtain the necessary Plymouth communications throughout your studies.

To change your password at any time - click on the ‘Change Password’ on the top right hand side of the homepage.

If you have forgotten your passwords please go to http://www.plymouth.ac.uk/password and you can reset it easily. Alternatively you can go to HE Operations who will be able to reset it for you as well.

To access the portal type http:///student.plymouth.ac.uk into your browser OR if you want to go in via the extranet type www.plymouth.ac.uk and then click on Internal Students.

Enter the username and password given to you from your programme manager or Learning Resource Staff member.

The Student Community on the Portal signposts you to many resources including:

· E-resources, journals, databases - click on the myEdesk, Library, Media & IT (TIS)

· University student services and learning resources

· Link into UPSU, the University’s Student Union

· Academic information and regulations including the University student handbook

· How to work safely on the web

4 Programme Details

4.1 Enhancement Activities

An important aspect of this degree is its vocational nature. All students are encouraged to seek relevant employment or placement during their studies – that is why the actual ‘teaching’ timetable leaves you with some free time during the week. But additionally, many of the modules have vocational elements, such as practical experience, visits to and from individuals and organisations in your vocational area and simulations.

Rather than separating work related learning into a separate module the college has a policy of embedding work related activities across the programme. This means ensuring that there is a range of experiences which relate closely to employment and work, such as visits, visiting speakers, practical’s in simulated situations. This ensures that students have a very rich environment in which to develop their skills, and observe others working.

Students of Cornwall College are encouraged to develop their PDPs in a variety of ways. The tutorial system, where programme leaders act as personal tutors and see their tutees on a regular basis clearly feeds into the principles of PDP. At the end of each module, students are encouraged to review what they have learnt and how it might contribute to their employability and their personal development. And there is a similar end of term and end of year review conducted by the tutor.

4.2 Progression through the programme

An important aspect of this top up degree is its vocational nature. All students are encouraged to seek relevant employment or placement during their studies – that is why the actual ‘teaching’ timetable leaves you with some free time during the week. But additionally, many of the modules have vocational elements, such as practical experience, visits to and from individuals and organisations in your vocational area and simulations.

After completion of the degree students will be able to progress into one of the University’s masters level programmes in business, into the College’s CMI in management Level 7 (assuming relevant work experience), or one of a number of careers. In the past these careers have included local government, sales and marketing, retail, hotel and leisure, banking, finance, teaching and general management progression through the programme

Your Programme Manager has access to University staff and is able to communicate your questions regarding progression to programmes at Plymouth University.

If you progress to a Plymouth University honours degree programme, your final Honours Degree classification will be calculated to include marks from each of your levels of study.

10% from Level 4 – calculated from the highest achieved 80 credits. Where modules are arranged in such a way that the 80 credits of ‘highest module marks’ cannot be identified unequivocally, the average for the best 70 credits and 90 credits will be calculated and the student given the best advantage.

30% from Level 5

60% from Level 6

If you progress onto Level 5 of a programme at Plymouth University, then 10% (of the highest achieved 80 credits or where modules are arranged in such a way that the 80 credits of ‘highest module marks’ cannot be identified unequivocally, the average for the best 70 credits and 90 credits will be calculated and the student given the best advantage) will come from your level 4 marks studied previously, 30% of yourlevel 5 aggregate mark will be drawn from the level 5 modules studied at Plymouth University and then 60% from your level 6aggregate mark at Plymouth University.

4.3 HE Careers Guidance – Cornwall College

HE Careers and Employability – please promote to your students

· There is a new HE Careers and Employability section on Moodle; accessible via the Learner Resources tab. This is a really useful resource which both you and your students can use. Please e-mail Heidi Channell with details of any other web resources you use and she will add them to Moodle:

· UCAS Applications for Teacher Training open on 27th October.

· Encourage your HE students to access HE Careers Advice by e-mailing Heidi:

· Here is a link to the Plymouth University Careers & Employability site which includes the Events Calendar:

http://www.plu.prospects.ac.uk/casa/servlet/casa.jobseeker.event.JSEventServlet?mode=showEv&event_id=SUBOPLU-07072015-EVNT-35658&source=casa.jobseeker.event.JSEventServlet%3Fmode%3DshowCal%26month%3DAll%26eventType%3DO%26seriesStr%3D&stack=null%3Anull

4.4 HE Careers Guidance – Plymouth University

As a Plymouth University student you will also be able to access the Plymouth University Careers and Employability Service which can provide a wealth of guidance and support resources.

5 Employment Opportunities

Whilst studying this programme you will be given the opportunity to develop further personal and employability related skills, through planned module content and also external opportunities. A range of teaching approaches are used to specifically enable you to develop and enhance your communication and team working skills. Employers and other industry professionals also input into the programme giving you further contacts.