School of Mathematics

Industrial placement

The Industrial Placement scheme is available with all our BSc degree programmes. It involves spending your third year in full-time employment, giving you the opportunity to experience salaried work before you graduate.

Watch a video of a student discussing the Industrial Placement scheme.

Information from graduates and employers indicates that, when recruiting, most employers look favourably upon a year spent in industry and so your year working in industry can make all the difference in the job interviews after you graduate.

Experiencing an industrial placement will boost your self-confidence, not only in your chosen subject area, but in the marketplace generally. Furthermore, you will be in paid employment for 9-15 months and generally expect to earn an annual salary of £15,000-25,000, but it can be higher.

The School of Mathematics maintains a list of employers which includes previous placements, as well as others who have shown an interest. While this is not an exhaustive list, for many it will give an indication of the sorts of jobs and companies which are appropriate. The Careers Centre will also provide you with a lot of help.

Students from the School of Mathematics have recently spent their year in industry at the following companies:

• American Express
• Arcadia
• Aviva
• Bloom Media
• BT
• Department of Work & Pensions
• Eddie Stobart
• Ernst & Young
• Eversheds
• Fujitsu
• Goldman Sachs
• Grant Thornton
• HM Customs and Excise
• IBM
• KPMG
• Landrover
• Lloyds
• Mazars
• MBDA
• Morgan Stanley
• National Air-Traffic Controllers
• NFU Mutual
• Provident
• Redmayne-Bentley
• Rolls-Royce
• Tata Steel
• Unilever

An industrial placement can benefit you by: 

• Providing valuable experience in the corporate environment and an irreplaceable insight into your chosen career path
• Boosting your employability on graduation
• Giving you the opportunity to work as part of a team to deliver commercially valuable objectives 
• Putting your academic learning into context by using it in a real-life situation
• Providing you with a salary for a year
• Helping you gain independence

Please see our year in industry leaflet for more details.

How does it work?
You decide whether or not you want to transfer to this scheme during the second year. You will then transfer onto a four-year 'industrial' version of your degree and spend your third year working full-time, returning to us for the fourth year and being awarded a BSc (Industry) degree on successful completion of your course.

In order to make the transfer, you must do sufficiently well in year 1 and 2 examinations; typically, a grade average of at least 55 is required.

You are responsible for finding your own placement, but the School of Mathematics will assist (for example, by maintaining a list of previous placements) and advise on the suitability of any proposals. You are welcome to take the initiative and make use of your own contacts in order to make your own suggestions.

Each placement is assessed on an individual basis. It is expected that any placement will give you a challenging experience, however, it need not (and usually will not) involve university-level mathematics. Typically employers of maths students look for generic skills such as numeracy and problem-solving ability, rather than subject-specific skills; so maths students enjoy a wide variety of employment options. 

During your year in industry you will have an ‘industrial supervisor’ – someone employed in your chosen company, plus an academic supervisor from the School of Mathematics who will keep in touch, visit you at work, and take responsibility for your progress.

For more information please email Professor Mark Kelmanson