Education and History

Education and history is a combination that brings together two disciplines deeply concerned with how knowledge, values, and understanding are transmitted across generations and through time. At the University of Strathclyde, the BA Education and History is a four-year full-time programme that includes a year abroad, giving you an international dimension that enriches both subjects. As the current description notes, studying history develops your knowledge of the past and gives you a better understanding of the present, a claim that is equally true of education studied seriously.

The history strand of the programme develops your ability to work with primary and secondary sources, to situate events and developments within their broader political, social, and cultural contexts, and to construct well-reasoned historical arguments. You will engage with periods and places according to your interests, with the curriculum typically covering both Scottish and British history alongside broader European and world dimensions. The education strand develops your understanding of how schools, educational systems, and pedagogical practices have developed historically and how they operate today, drawing on psychology, sociology, and policy studies alongside the history of education itself.

Together, the two subjects develop a particularly coherent intellectual perspective: understanding education historically means understanding how ideas about what children need to know, and who deserves access to learning, have changed and been contested over time.

Graduates of education and history programmes move into careers in teaching, educational research, heritage and museum education, community education, youth work, publishing, the civil service, and policy roles connected to education and culture. Teaching is a natural pathway, and the degree provides a strong academic foundation for subsequent teacher training. The history component opens doors in archive work, heritage management, journalism, and the arts, while the education dimension is valuable in any career involving work with young people or in learning environments.

The year abroad deepens your comparative understanding of how education works across different national contexts. Some graduates go on to postgraduate study in history, education, or teacher training programmes.