Criminology students across Levels 4, 5, and 6 took part in an exceptional educational visit to HMP Dovegate, combining academic insight with real‑world experience. The programme included a guided tour of the prison, expert talks from operational staff on rehabilitation and sentence management, and an in‑depth session within Dovegate’s Democratic Therapeutic Community (DTC), where students explored therapeutic intervention in practice.
HMP Dovegate is one of only five prisons in England operating a Democratic Therapeutic Community, offering students a rare opportunity to hear directly from residents about their journeys from offending to rehabilitation. This distinctive experience is rarely available at undergraduate level and provides powerful insight into lived experiences of the criminal justice system.
The visit also strengthened employability, with students meeting Alumni of the programme currently working within the prison and learning about career pathways into prisons, probation, and wider rehabilitative services.
Fully embedded within the curriculum, the trip directly supports core teaching on modules in Prison Law and Probation Regulations (Level 5), Rehabilitation of Offenders (Level 6), and the wider Criminology programme. It exemplifies the applied, experiential learning that defines the BSc (Hons) Criminology degree and clearly differentiates it within a competitive recruitment landscape.