Extended Project Qualification (EPQ) support | University of Westminster, London

The EPQ (Extended Project Qualification) provides the opportunity to demonstrate creativity through engagement with a diverse range of topics.

Projects could include: the writing of an extended essay on the dangers of advertising; conducting a scientific investigation on boiling an egg; building a robot; making a film; producing a newspaper; writing a screenplay; designing a computer programme; making a video game… the choices are endless!

The EPQ is an independent research project providing you with the opportunity to demonstrate your ability to think critically, creatively and in depth about a topic. Designed to extend learning beyond the curriculum, it allows you to explore new and diverse directions.

Here at the University of Westminster we have developed a range of resources and programmes for students and teachers to support this exciting opportunity.

Online EPQ course for students

The University of Westminster has partnered with FutureLearn to create Critical Thinking in Practice: Key Skills for NEAs and EPQs.

Our course gives your students the opportunity to learn key critical thinking and research skills with the help of world-class researchers and lecturers.

What does the course involve?

Our self-paced online course is designed for you to use alongside your own teaching to enhance the core skills of your students, allowing them to excel in independent learning tasks.

Broken into six learning units, we work with you and your students to develop research ideas, plan projects, discover research methods, and how to read and write critically – a key skill in all of their studies.

We show your students how to access over 100 million free-to-access journal articles, datasets and reports that will support work in any subject area.

How can the course support my teaching?

The course supports your teaching style. You can:

set your students tasks from the course in your classroom, where you can support their learning too
ask students to complete parts of the course for homework between your live sessions
run an intensive week of workshops using this course as a backbone
make it a half-term activity

With the expertise of highly experienced researchers, lecturers, professors and chartered teachers, you will be fully supported in helping your students develop critical thinking skills and mastering their coursework, NEAs and EPQs.

Learn more about this course and how to use it in your classroom through this short video:

Find out more and join the course

You can find full course information and the link to join on FutureLearn.

Go to Futurelearn

Workshops

Training workshops for librarians and teachers

To support learning on our online course we provide training workshops for librarians and teachers. This workshop introduces you to the course, shows you how to get yourself and students signed up, and suggests ways it can support your teaching. We also provide guidance in teaching the EPQ and Non-Examination Assessments (NEAs).

For more information and to book a staff workshop, please contact Doug Specht at [email protected].

In-person workshops for students and schools

We also offer a limited number of in-person workshops delivered either at our Harrow Campus or on site in your school, these workshops are designed to help students at every stage of the creation process from topic and idea generation through to final writing and rewriting the extended essay. These workshops are primarily for students and schools who have already engaged with our online provision. Those schools who complete the Future Learn course will be invited to said workshops. If you have not been invited and believe you should have been, or would like to discuss a special provision/workshop for your students please contact Doug Specht at [email protected].

EPQ Media Studies Resources

Created by senior academics from our School of Media and Communications these resources are designed to help promote ideas and activities for Research Methods, and Media Studies related work.

Each card contains key information on its topic, provides suggestions for further open access readings and group work to explore contemporary themes in media communication. These resources also offer a way into other subjects, including Sociology, History, Geography and English. Our range of research focused resources can be used to guide students in any discipline.

download all epq Media Studies cards (9.5MB)

Media and Identity

In a world where identity and the media are ever more closely linked, the cards in this series seek to explore how our own identity is constructed and represented through the media we consume, and what the wider implications of this are.

These cards provoke questions around what makes us human, what makes us who we are and how are we represented in the media.

Media and Society

Media and Society are inextricably linked in our modern world of mass communication and mass consumption. These cards draw out and challenge some of the key debates surrounding the social, political and economic significance of the media and how these are changing in the 21st Century.

Media Production

How do you listen to music? Is there a trick to radio production? What is the link between production, distribution and exhibition? The media production cards series looks at aspects of production across media platforms.

Supporting the creation of production with theory and conceptual thinking, these cards show how to develop an academic approach to a practical discipline.

Researching Media and Communications

This series of research methods cards introduces the main research traditions in media and communication studies and explores a range of methods of data collection and analysis employed in research.

A range of research methods are demonstrated here with each card examining a different stage of the research and writing process.

More information

For more information on the courses and resources created by the School of Media and Communications contact Doug Specht at [email protected].

These resources were developed by the Westminster School of Media and Communication. The project has been coordinated by Eleanor Roseblade, Doug Specht, Eleri Kyffin and Sara Hafeez.