10 Reasons to Choose Us

If you decide to come to Birmingham City University, you can be confident that you’ll be transformed with the skills and confidence to succeed when you graduate.

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You'll receive a first-class education with a focus on practical skills and professional relevance. Not only that, but Birmingham offers so many opportunities for transforming lives and setting up a business. Taking a Higher Education course is a big investment in your future, and you’ll want to be sure that you’re choosing the right course and the right university. So here's our top reasons to choose Birmingham City University.

1. Investing in your future

We’ve invested over £400 million in our campuses and facilities, including a major expansion of our City Centre Campus and a £41 million extension at our City South Campus with specialist laboratories for our new courses in sport and life sciences, which opened in 2018. Take a look at our campus buildings in more depth on our YouTube channel.

2. Work experience, placements and careers support

You'll have the chance to gain industry and professional practice experience through work placements, mentoring schemes and Study Abroad exchanges overseas. We also work on course-related projects with companies and organisations like Microsoft, Cisco, Jaguar Land Rover, Sky UK and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra.

We offer career support and advice throughout your time with us and for up to three years after you graduate. Our Graduate+ scheme embeds career-related skills into every one of our degree courses.

3. Earn while you learn

Our student employment agency allows you to apply for paid roles at the University, gaining experience in crucial aspects of job applications and valuable feedback on your work.

4. Internationally accredited courses

Many of our courses have internationally recognised accreditations, such as the ACCA (Association of Chartered Certified Accountants), CIMA (Chartered Institute of Management Accountants) and RIBA (Royal Institute of British Architects).

5. Scholarship schemes

We want all our students to achieve their full potential - and we're here to back you every step of the way. With our scholarship schemes, you could receive extra funding and support to kick start your BCU journey.

6. Help starting your own business

We have a designated entrepreneurship team and our STEAMhouse incubator supports students who want to work for themselves. Students will have access to hands-on workshops, lectures, enterprise programmes and tailored advice to help develop their ideas into start-up businesses.

7. A global city

Study with us and you will be located at the heart of the dynamic city of Birmingham – with all the social and employment possibilities that brings. Birmingham is the youngest major city in Europe, with under-20s accounting for 29% of its population (West Midlands Growth Company).

8. Learn from the best

From the UK’s leading criminologist to a ‘Hot 100’ jeweller, our teaching staff come from and maintain links with industry, and are some of the leading figures in their fields.

9. Practice-based research

93% of our research was recognised internationally for originality, significance and rigour, of which 19% was judged world-leading (Research Excellence Framework 2021).

10. Transformed teaching

We have transformed our curriculum with a new range of contemporary, flexible courses with practice-based learning and international opportunities built into every stage. Our 2,000-strong team of teaching staff come from and maintain their links with industry and the professions, ensuring you benefit directly from their knowledge, insight and contacts.

00:00:00: In the centre of Birmingham and just a short walk from the train station is BCU - Birmingham City University.

00:00:12: If you're trying to decide what university to go to and why you should consider BCU then here are my top reasons of why I decided to study here and why I love it so much.

00:00:23: First off would be the amazing facilities that we have here at BCU. Whatever course you're studying they are second to none and spread across four sites across the city. I'm studying Product and Furniture Design and here I have absolutely everything I need. Across all the other courses that BCU has to offer, the School of Art at Margret Street has incredible printing facilities, workshop spaces and studios that students can use. Over at the School of Jewellery, they have their incredible traditional workshops as well as the latest technology for jewellery design. If you're studying one of our media courses then you will have access to amazing spaces like this studio, students have full use of these facilities are also used by industry providing great opportunities for students. There are four studios: a green screen, photographic and radio studios all built to a fully professional standard.

00:01:10: The Curzon building houses The Eagle and Ball, a 19th century renovated pub run by our Students' Union. In the Curzon building you'll find our library which is open 24 hours a day as well as our campus shop. If you are studying on one of our courses here you may find yourself spending time in our city trading room or participating in mock trials in our Law Courts.

00:01:32: Over at our city south campus our facilities offer hands-on practical experience with professional equipment for Health and Social care and Life Sciences. If you are studying on this campus you'll have access to cutting-edge facilities such as birthing rooms and operating theatre and biomedical science labs. Our Sports and exercise science students also have access to specialist equipment and facilities at the Alexander Stadium which you might recognize from the 2022 Commonwealth Game,s here students learn alongside professional sports organizations such as UK Athletics.

00:02:05: Birmingham is one of the fastest growing cities in the UK and with the Uni's connection to all of that there is a whole bunch of opportunities that BCU can provide for you as more companies move into the city it provides access that you will have to specialized work placements and because of Birmingham's unique position in the country there is the ability to travel anywhere in the UK. Here at our City South campus, you will find plenty of placement opportunities. Completing a placement is an excellent way of putting what you have learned on your course into practice if you are studying on one of our health courses this can be really useful, where you might make the transition from the mock ward where we are now and onto the real thing.

00:02:45: Finally choosing to come to BCU is choosing to join the most supportive and diverse community that anyone could wish to be a part of. It's not just the uni but the city itself that pulls people in from all over the world and different cultures there really is not nothing like it, as well as students there are also our lecturers from a wide range of backgrounds feeding their expertise into the BCU Community. Student life here is something you can really immerse yourself in, be it on campus getting involved in dozens of Societies or making the most of hanging around the city with friends and coursemates so that's why I think you should choose to come and join us at Birmingham City University. But don't take my word for it, take a look online and check out the courses that you're interested in and then perhaps you will come here and find out for yourself why you should choose BCU!