Nutrition BSc(Hons)

Course structure 

You will learn through lectures, seminars, workshops and group activities, ensuring that your study is varied and stimulating. Two placements enable you to gain hands-on experience to help you prepare for career success, and you’ll learn from experts through guest lectures and field trips.

You'll be based on our Eastbourne campus however some modules may be taught in Brighton on the Falmer campus. Our campuses are well-served by public transport with discounted student fares.

Years 1 and 2 consist of core modules and in your final year you choose option modules.

Making sure that what you learn with us is relevant, up to date and what employers are looking for is our priority, so courses are reviewed and enhanced on an ongoing basis. When you have applied to us, we will inform you of any improvements or innovations to the curriculum through Student View.

Specialist routes

Nutrition is a broad subject but our course will let you try out all of these areas.

Midway through your second year you can choose to follow one of  our specialist pathways:

• Nutrition with Public Health BSc(Hons)
• Nutrition with Sport and Exercise BSc(Hons)

Or you can continue on the single honours award.

Public health pathway
On the public health pathway you’ll develop a comprehensive knowledge and systematic understanding of public health principles and policies. You’ll also gain understanding of the concepts in the planning and analysis of research, and the basis of analysis commonly used in health and social care research. 

Sport and exercise pathway
This pathway will enable you to develop vocationally relevant expertise in nutrition relating to sport and exercise science. You’ll gain a broad knowledge of the key academic areas of biomechanics, physiology and psychology.

Year 1

The first year focuses on the basics of human nutrition including the agri-­food sector, consumer behaviour, physiology and exercise.

You will be familiarised in key concepts of public health and nutrition while being introduced to the most commonly used research and nutritional project frameworks.

Modules

• Introduction to Key Concepts in Health and Public Health

  This module will introduce you to public health and primary care and will form a foundation for many of the modules in year one and years two and three. The module will enable you to familiarise yourself with desk top and field work exploration of the factors that determine health, provision and access to health care, other public services and public and commercial amenities.

• Introduction to Public Health Research and Project Methods

  This module will introduce you to two key aspects of public health practice, the design and management of projects; and the nature generating evidence through research, audit and evaluation.

• Physiology for Sport and Exercise

  This module will introduce fundamental principles and systems of physiology with regard to maturation, gender and health state. You will learn how these are researched in the laboratory and field in relation to exercise, sport and health, and will develop practical laboratory techniques to collect, interpret and disseminate physiological data.

• Introduction to Human Nutrition

  This module will enable you to develop your understanding of human nutrition, dietary nutrients, the concept of a balanced diet and changing nutritional requirements across the lifespan. You will also consider the impact of social and psychological factors that impact food choice and patterns of consumption.

• Exploring the Agri-food Sector

  This module will introduce you to the activities undertaken in the agri-food sector, with an overview of  the key stakeholders and stages within the food, production, processing, supply and consumption processes. You will also explore the role of economics, technology, transport and food waste as they have increasing significance on the future stability of the agri-food sector and the wider food economy.

• Food Consumer Behaviour

  This module introduces you to the more widely accepted sub-disciplines associated with food consumer behaviour. You'll explore conceptual models, map typologies and consumer activities, and develop an appreciation of the factors that influence consumer food choice and purchasing behaviours.

Year 2

In the first half of your second year you will explore food policy, enabling behaviour change, and nutrition health and disease.

During the second half of the year you can choose to focus on public health or sport and exercise through your module choices, or to carry on with the nutrition only route.

Community Engagement for Public Health is a great opportunity to undertake a placement with a public health or related organisation gaining valuable work experience and exploring the planning and implementation of public health activities.

Modules

Core modules

• Food Policy
• Enabling Behavioural Change
• Nutrition, Health and Disease
• Community Engagement for Public Health

Nutrition only

• Data Analysis and Research Methods
• Nutrition for Physical Activity

Public health

• Epidemiology and Research Methods
• Global Perspectives on Public Health

Sport and exercise

• Data Analysis and Research Methods
• Nutrition for Physical Activity

Final year

In your final year you will continue to develop your areas of interest through option modules and carry out research for your dissertation.

The Nutrition Consultancy module provides you with a second placement opportunity with a commercial organisation.

Core modules 

• Nutrition Consultancy
• Nutrition Programme and Project Planning
• Dissertation or Dissertation for Public Health (if choosing the public health route)

Options*

Nutrition and Public health routes – choose two

• Food and Society
• Health Promotion for Public Health Improvement
• Physiological Aspects of Exercise, Nutrition and Health
• Food Biochemistry and Functionality

Sport and exercise – choose two

• Sports Nutrition
• Physiological Aspects of Exercise, Nutrition and Health 
• Exercise, Sport and the Brain 
• Food Biochemistry and Functionality

*Option modules are indicative and may change, depending on timetabling and staff availability.

Facilities

The Eastbourne campus, where the course is based, has a range of specialist facilities to help you make the most of your studies.

Nutrition suite
Our nutrition suite is a modern commercial kitchen which will be used for demonstrations, food preparation and consumer research.

Sport and exercise science labs
Our six laboratories are accredited by the British Association of Sport and Exercise Sciences (BASES). They include a physiology lab, biochemical analysis lab and a biomechanics laboratory.

Find out more about the facilities available to our nutrition students.

Placements 

In your second and final year, you’ll put your classroom learning into practice during professional work placements. Our employability hub will help you to find a placement that meets your interests and career aspirations. 

In your second year you will spend around 50 hours with a not-for-profit organisation gaining experience of public health practice. The placement will be within a public health or nutrition related organisation, in the not-for-profit sector, such as a local authority, non-governmental organisation, NHS, charity, social enterprise or similar. You’ll develop an understating of planning, implementation and monitoring or evaluation of public health activities. 

In your final year you will spend around 40 hours in the commercial sector. You’ll be challenged to demonstrate your skills as a consultant within a nutritional setting. You will learn about the role of the consultant and the skills necessary to succeed before being placed with a real life food SME client to either complete a nutrition focused project, solve a nutrition related problem or exploit a nutrition related opportunity.

Meet the team

Harvey Ells, course leader

Before joining the university, Harvey worked in a variety of strategic operational roles for UK-based national food retailers. He holds an MA in Learning and Development, an MSc in Food Policy, Certificates in Research Methods and Academic Practice and is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. Since joining the university Harvey has focused on the development of our food-related course provision at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels.

His personal research interests focus primarily on food street markets where he is working on completing his PhD at the Centre for Food Policy at City, University of London. His other interests include: pop-up food formats, food and retail SMEs, food branding, community food projects, sustainable food supply chains and UK based urban agriculture.

Harvey has completed a wide range of consultancy and knowledge transfer activities that have helped to inform and update our taught portfolio. Past projects have included successfully completing 3 'A' Rated Knowledge Transfer Partnerships (KTPs) with food SMEs (including Stein's Seafood Restaurant in Padstow), two national research projects on behalf of the Institute of Customer Service and hospitality evaluations for Tourism South East.

More recently he has completed an ESRC funded KTP with St Wilfrid's Hospice Eastbourne, a BBSRC funded project in collaboration with Sussex University on food satiety and TSB funded innovation voucher work with Tablehurst Farm.

He has recently published book chapters on retailing at the Olympics, Retail Knowledge Transfer and Food Tourism Supply Chains. Harvey is currently an External Examiner at the University of Portsmouth and regularly acts as an external expert on course validations.

Key members of the teaching team

Dr Kathy Martyn
Carol Williams
Stephanie Stevens
Dr Ifigenia Giannopoulou
Dr Peter Watt
Dr Louisa Beale
Dr Gary Brickley

Sport at Brighton

Sport Brighton

Sport Brighton brings together our sport and recreation services. As a Brighton student you’ll have use of sport and fitness facilities across all our campuses and there are opportunities to play for fun, fitness or take part in serious competition. 

Find out more about Sport Brighton.

Sports Scholarships

Our sports scholarship scheme is designed to help students develop their full sporting potential to train and compete at the highest level. We offer scholarships for elite athletes, elite disabled athletes and talented sports performers.

Find out more about Sport Scholarships.

Cricket Academy

New for September 2023, our Cricket Academy offers aspiring players the opportunity to continue their cricket development alongside studying for a degree. The programme offers a world-class training environment with the highest quality coaching.

Find out more about the Cricket Academy.

International requirements and visas

We can help you meet our English language or academic entry requirements.

Visas and immigration advice

Course fees

Info

The fees listed here are for full-time courses beginning in the academic year 2022–23.

Further tuition fees are payable for each subsequent year of study and are subject to an annual increase of no more than 5% or RPI (whichever is the greater). The annual increase for UK students, who are subject to regulated fees, will increase no more than the statutory maximum fee.

You can find out more about our fees in the university's student contract and tuition fee policy (pdf).

The tuition fee you have to pay depends on a number of factors including the kind of course you take, and whether you study full-time or part-time. If you are studying part-time you will normally be charged on a pro rata basis depending on the number of modules you take.

Campus where this course is taught

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