Geography (International Year One) 2026 entry

Course information may change. Module information and course content, teaching and assessment may change each year and after you have accepted your offer to study at the University of St Andrews. We display the most up-to-date information possible, but this could be from a previous academic year. For the latest module information, see the module catalogue.

• Semester 1

  • Welcome to the Anthropocene: Society, Population, Environment: shows how Geography, a discipline that draws on knowledge that spans the social and natural sciences and the humanities, is uniquely placed to understand our changing world. As the global population speeds past 7 billion, mounting evidence about resource depletion and climate change, and global economic inequality and social injustice, suggests current human development is unsustainable and that we are now living in the Anthropocene, an era in which human activity has, for the first time, become the dominant driver of environmental processes and is causing unprecedented global change. 
  • Foundation Inorganic and Physical Chemistry: develops your existing knowledge and understanding of inorganic and physical chemistry, and mirrors much of the inorganic and physical content of the first year Chemistry degree course at the University of St Andrews. This module provides you with a useful introduction to many of the chemical concepts which are used in organic and biological chemistry courses.
  • Communicating in Academic Contexts 1: helps you develop and practise productive and receptive academic spoken communication skills to use within the International Foundation programme and in your undergraduate programme. 
  • Research and Writing for Science A: explores a range of academic functions, including features of academic style and organisation, academic grammar and vocabulary. You will learn how to evaluate the reliability of a variety of published texts and develop your own academic voice with the aim of improving your overall academic literacy but with a focus on the texts you need to write for science.

• Semester 2

  • A World in Crisis?: explores how Geography works as a 'world discipline' that is equipped to examine global problems from a range of human, environmental and physical geography perspectives. Contemporary global problems such as pollution, biodiversity loss and population growth are critical issues for the planet's future and demonstrate the interdependence of social and environmental systems. This module unpacks the complexity of these challenges by analysing different manifestations of 'a world in crisis' as questions of geography - shaped by geographic processes operating at a range of scales (from the global to the local). Teaching comprises a mix of lecture learning and project work on selected global problems.
  • Foundation Organic Chemistry: introduces the key concepts of organic chemistry and will develop your existing understanding of structure and bonding of covalently bonded molecules and introduce you to a range of spectroscopic methods for determining the structure of organic compounds. You will become acquainted with the common functional groups in organic molecules and how they react, using arrow-pushing mechanisms to describe and explain reaction outcomes.
  • Communicating in Academic Contexts 2: helps you further develop and practise productive and receptive academic oral communication skills that you will need to draw on in your degree programme.
  • Research and Writing for Science B: further develops the skills introduced in Research and Writing Skills for Science A in Semester 1 with students working on more extended research skills using references and using them to support arguments in science. 

• Teaching and assessment

  Your classes take place Monday to Friday between 9am and 6pm. In a typical week you will spend around 16 hours a week on your focused learning activities like live lectures, seminars and tutorials. To ensure our students are getting tailored support, we schedule seminar classes with groups of no more than 16 students.  

  You will also be expected to complete around 25 hours of independent study each week to achieve your academic goals.  

  Assessment 

  Each module will have a range of assessments with regular feedback from our teaching team. These assessments may include: 

  • academic essays 
  • exams (in-person or online) 
  • tests 
  • speaking and listening exam 
  • integrated skills exams 
  • leading and participating in seminars 
  • presentations  
  • lab and practical or field trip reports 
  • research projects 

  The grade from each module contributes to the final programme grade. Each module handbook will include information on assessments.