 So I'm hoping that everyone can see just the introductory slide on the screen there and let us make a start. So thanks again for joining us. Thanks for your interest in the program. SEDEP is part of the University of London system. The University of London system has a huge number of students all over the world at the moment. Something like 55,000 students study by distance with the University of London. Many of them undergraduate but lots of them also postgraduate. So SEDEP is one of the so-called LEED colleges that provides distance learning programs under the University of London umbrella. The University of London has a well over 150 years of experience of online learning to draw on. SEDEP is actually the largest provider of postgraduate programs within the University of London. There are three programs that are run out of SEDEP. There's ourselves, Centre for Development and Environmental Policy. There's a Centre for Finance and Management Studies and Centre for International Studies and Diplomacy. Just within SELUS, we also have a large number of students in a large number of countries. SEDEP programs, there are five of them currently. We do withdraw programs and we do introduce new programs as we go along. So no program is there permanently. Our two biggest programs at the moment are Sustainable Development, which I think was introduced in early 2000s and Poverty Reduction, which was introduced in 2009. And we have three other programs which have been going on for longer than that, Environmental Management, Economics and Agricultural Economics. We are very much hoping to launch a climate change and development program from the autumn of this year. We talk mainly about our MSCs, but actually you can study individual modules with us as individual professional awards. You can study specific combinations of those to get a postgraduate certificate in any of the five programs I've just mentioned. You can study eight modules to get a postgraduate diploma or you can study eight modules and the dissertation in order to complete a master's. So the fees are basically £1,050 per module. So ultimately you need nine for an MSC, which takes you to 9,450 and you pay as you go. So unlike on campus where you have to basically pay almost everything up front, here if you take a couple of modules in your first year then you just pay for those two modules and as you take more you pay. So it means you can spread your cost of your MSC over your entire registration program, your entire registration period. I've just realised that my slides are skipping so I'm jumping back on slides. On this slide tells you about the registration period. If you're studying just individual modules, I think you get two years in which to do it. We have two terms which I should tell you about. The main study session starts in February and runs through to exams at the end of September, but there's a sort of accelerated track which is what many of you might now be interested in I guess, which starts in May and again runs through to the same exam period. So you basically take the same materials whether you start in February or in May, but doing that twice a speed if you're starting in May. So we would normally advise you to take one or two modules in May, whereas if you start in February you can take three or four if you want to. If you're registering for an MSC program you will be given a five year registration period in which to complete your nine modules. The most common time for completion is three years, a minority of students completing two, some do take their five and in fact there is provision in our regulations if you haven't quite finished in five to have one extra year on top of that as well. So you have to decide how long you want to take and obviously the quicker you want to do it the more hours per week you have to find in order to be able to do that. For a postgraduate diploma you also have a five year registration period for a postgraduate certificate Ditto, although you can finish it in one year. What you get if you do study with us is that you get course guides sent to you. In fact nowadays you get your key readings sent to you and your textbooks sent to you but all the materials that we have written for you are available via our virtual learning environment. You can either study them online or you can download them and study them at your leisure. You get a dedicated tutor and a discussion forum for each module where you can ask questions or join in debate about topics that are in the course materials. The tutor can also answer any particular questions that you have. We run webinars for every module so typically in the course of a study session there will be maybe three sets of webinars of introductory one and then we've released one on some parts of the study materials that we think we'd like to take you through and there will be an exam preparation webinar just before the exams in the latter part of September. At the moment students get access to the University of London online library and we have to say that's not the strongest part of our programme provision. We are looking to get you full access to the online resources of the SOAS Library which is a much richer collection of journals and e-books for the topics that we cover. That will be we hope up and running for the February 2018 study session. One of the things in our programme is if you have over a thousand people many of them quite experienced professionals studying together and have really good opportunities for networking with other students through the discussion forum for our different modules and then you take that on yourselves after you've got to know people on the discussion forum. The way we assess our courses for every module there is an assignment which either happens at the end of June or happens at the beginning of August. That's worth 20% of the mark and then there's an exam which is worth 80% of the mark. Let me take those in turn. The assignment if you're registering for a module in May then your assignment will be due on the 1st of August. If you're registering for some of the modules in February then your assignment will be due at the end of June and you get 8 to 10 weeks where the assignment is available on our online learning environment. You can have a look at it, you can make your preparations for it. In fact we only expect it to take you about 15 hours which may be one week of your study time but we give you 8 to 10 weeks because we know that people have busy work lives and they travel, they have other things going on. So somewhere in the 8 to 10 weeks you find time to submit the assignment. The exam is a little bit less flexible. The exam timetable is already published. It is available certainly on our virtual learning environment. I'm not sure if it's available on the website. But in the last two weeks of September each module has an exam date. The exam can be taken in an approved University of London centre in almost any country in the world. But you do have to be there for the particular day that the exam is set because we can't set exams on multiple dates otherwise papers can get spread around and people can study it first and pass the papers on to others. So you do have to check out the exam date for your particular module. Okay, we've talked about the study sessions. If you are looking to start on the main study session now your application deadline for us is the 31st of March and we will turn that around very quickly and then we'll look for you to enrol a couple of weeks later. The next study session then starts in February 2018 and the application deadline will be sometime in March of that. The next slide shows you where our students are based. As you will see we have plenty of students based in Europe. The distribution of students varies actually by programme so environmental management for example I think there are more in Europe than in some of our other programmes in the poverty reduction programme there are more in Africa and Asia will be given by this overall distribution but the main point to show you is that we have students from all over the world. I think we have them in 100 plus countries just in setup alone. Many of our students are already in work I can talk a bit more about that in response to questions but so I'm just getting distracted by the chat there. Many of our students are already in work but these are some of the organisations that our students either are working with or might look to go and work with afterwards. We have lots of students in international organisations we have plenty of students in NGOs we have in the programme I'm personally responsible for poverty reduction we have many students looking to move into development related subjects from a whole range of backgrounds including various commercial private sector law education looking to get into development work. So we have a wide range of backgrounds and experience on the programme and also to contribute to discussion on the discussion for. Here are just a couple of testimonies from students who have recently finished with us saying what they like about the programmes. One of the things I think we pride ourselves on in particular is the very strong course materials that we send to you with lots of work goes into preparing high quality course materials that cover quite a broad range of topics that introduce you to current debates introduce you to literature and lead you through those topics. So just a reminder if you're looking to start in May our application date is 31st of March and we look forward to receiving applications from some of you. So thank you for those of you who have already put some questions in which Beth is gathering for me as I've been talking. So I'm going to now turn to your questions and start answering them broadly in the order that they've come in and then please feel free to keep posting questions on the chat function whilst I talk and answer the questions that are coming in. So the first one, and it could probably say something about the likelihood of climate change and development indeed being run. That's a really good question. So we are confident that it will be running. It was actually approved, albeit after delay, early last year and the uncertainty has been exactly the format that it's going to be run in. We are making a proposal to our internal approval processes within SELAS next month for a new format for this program which will actually involve you taking fewer modules for each module carrying a higher credit rating than is the case in our current programs and if we get approval for that, that is how we will run it and we will still be looking to start in the autumn, probably in October. The reason for some of this uncertainty is that SELAS has been looking to achieve greater harmonisation across its three distance learning programs which I mentioned earlier and it's taken a while, but it looks like we're getting agreement on a common format and that's likely for new programs, as I said, to meet fewer modules, two entry points in the year, October and April and programs that fit that arrangement. If we get that confirmed, we will know it by the beginning of May and then we will announce it first and foremost for the climate change and development program and we'll make that available on our website. So, Marcia, I would like to apply to the Masters in Poverty Reduction. If I apply in May, I understand my assignment to June 1st of August. Do I need to take exams for the three core modules in September 2017? So, first of all, yes, you're correct about the assignment deadline for all modules for which you start in May. The deadline for the assignment is 1st of August. Now, do you need to take the exams for the three core modules in September? So, this takes us to the question of how fast you want to study. You have to do nine modules to complete an MSc. You have five years to do it. You can do it in as few as two and as many as five years and that's up to you. If you're going to go through the most common pace for our students which is to aim to finish in three years, then you would normally look to finish three modules in your first year. However, if you're starting in May, three modules is quite a big ask and I would probably suggest that you try and do two in May and see how you get on and then in one year you're going to do four modules rather than three if you're aiming to finish in the three years. Emma, some materials have said it may start in some June. Does it depend which module we're picking up? Emma, thank you for picking up on that. I assume therefore that our website is still a bit inconsistent on this. The answer is that up to a couple of years ago it was always June. We've actually moved it to May. It should always now say May and there's obviously one or two places where we haven't picked that up and corrected from June to May. The correct answer is now May start although it's normally about the last week in May. I think it's twenty something through May when we start. May is the answer for that one. Brenda, if one takes two modules in May it means in October you have to sit the two exams when does the next module start before the results or after you get the results? Okay, so two questions there. If you take two modules in May we hope that you proceed to sit both exams. I should say the exams are the second half of September. So you've put October but they should be the second half of September. Just to say if you are unable to sit the exam you can defer a module at no cost. So you don't lose money if you're not able to sit the exam although obviously we want to help as many people as possible to sit the exams. When does the next module start? Is it before the results or after you get the results? The next modules actually don't start until February. Our exam processes mean that the marking happens in October after you've sat the exams at the end of September. After they've been marked by two internal markers a selection is then sent to external examiners to check the quality of our marking to make sure you can be absolutely confident of the quality of the marking and therefore it's end of November when you have our formal exam board when all the examiners sit with the external examiners and approve all the marks that have been awarded and then the students are notified by the University of London in the first 10 days of December and that's before the deadline for registering for the next study session. If you want to wait until you've got your exam results, you can do so. You have a fairly quick turnaround if you do that but you do still have time to reflect on your results and apply for your next modules. If you want to and you're confident of moving forward onto new modules, you can register for new modules even before you've got your exam results and we are hoping this year to make study materials available fairly soon after you register so the advantages of registering early might be that you get to start reading through your module materials for your next session early if you register earlier. One more again. Will sustainable land management still run throughout 2018? Now, MRI haven't got access to the website here but I think that that is one of the modules where we have announced that the last exam will be in 2018 and assuming that that is the case, I think it's one of three where we've announced the last exam will be in 2018 that the module will run throughout the year there will be tutor support and everything you need to study but it will be your last chance to sit the exam in 2018 so I think that's a yes if you have any further questions on that put them in the chat and we'll get back to you but if we've said last exam in 2018 the module will run throughout the 2018 session Farah, in Canada and MSc will be very science and math based okay, so you're saying should we read much into the fact that this is called an MSc rather than an MA actually I don't think you should read too much into the fact that it's called an MSc so our economics programs obviously have a reasonable amount of maths and theory but all of our programs are at the applied end of the spectrum where MSc is concerned it's very much about the application of knowledge to current debates, current practical policy issues so we give you as much theory as we think will be helpful for you to inform your thinking about debates but we are not pushing theory for theory's sake we also have people from a very wide range of backgrounds coming into some of our programs so poverty reduction which is your example is quite a broad program we have people from a range of professional backgrounds and a range of first degrees coming in and therefore we don't make it to maths based it's helpful to have a core of maths but in the UK education system I would say that we don't require any maths of you which goes beyond what you would take in your public exams when you're 16 so GCSEs in the UK it's not a level maths requirement for example it's not maths you would need at 18 it's maths at 16 is really what we ask for if you have more than that you will get more out of some of the key readings because obviously there are readings which involve maths more than that but in terms of what we expect you to take out of those readings they're still accessible to you even if you don't have one of that maths we're not going to test you on your maths in exam questions in Melda please could you confirm how much online contact time per week is available with a tutor so Melda our discussion for online are what we call asynchronous that means they're open all the time and you are able to post your contributions to your questions at any time and the tutor is supposed to be monitoring it and over the 30 weeks if you start in February or the 16 weeks if you start in May every two to three days maximum they should be on there making sure that they have got back to you and kept the discussion going and answered your questions so it's really quite open-ended it's however much time you want to make available the things that are more specified are the webinars which are synchronous like this so everyone is online at the same time because of the difficulties of finding a time that works for everyone their webinars are optional and we in this session we run we try and run it two or three times to allow for differences in time zones so we do one which is breakfast time in the UK which caters for people in Australia in New Zealand and Pakistan we'll do one about this time of day and we'll do one in the evening UK time which might cater for people in the US and Canada who want to join us at their breakfast time so just with those a year but the online shooter contact time is asynchronous and it's open for you to post questions and request things at any time you want Farah are you looking at MSC environmental management are there any available funding opportunities to help with fees now Farah I'm afraid this is something that we do not score that highly on compared to some places we have not in my time had any funding specifically to help people and MSC environmental management in the past we have managed through a competitive bidding process to get some scholarships for poverty reduction but actually we haven't got any of those this year for environmental management I'm afraid you are looking at your employer or family and friends for funding if you are a UK student you are entitled to take out a UK student loan to study on our programs you can get a loan of up to £10,000 which therefore covers all of the program costs that's something the UK government has introduced for UK based students and this is the first year in which it happened but if you are outside the UK I'm afraid you will have to look for your funding for environmental management Paul is the cost of postage worldwide of course materials included in course fees and can material be sent to different addresses over the course of the program so the answer to both of those questions is yes as long as you keep us up to date with where you are living and where you need your course materials in principle every year you could have a different address and you would still get your course materials sent to you in the same way you can attend a different exam centre each year if you happen to be in a different country at exam time as long as when you register for the exam you say which country you are looking to take the exam in one of the strengths of the University of London system is all of that is very flexible for you by the way I hope you are pronouncing your names correctly here what is the maximum number of courses I can do if I am starting in May so we have had somebody do I believe four modules in May we gave them special dispensation for that they demonstrate to us that they have taken time off work they were effectively studying full time from May through to September and they did four modules if you are not doing that we would recommend that you do two in May taking two in May is equivalent to taking four in September which is sorry four in February which is quite a significant workload but if you want to persuade us that you have more time available the programme convener can give you permission to take more modules so let me just go through very briefly how we assess the workload if you are taking a module starting in February it is a 30 week course it is a 30 week study session our modules carry 15 credits towards your MSc an MSc of 180 credits each credit is supposed to be 10 hours so a 15 credit module is supposed to be 150 hours study so if you are studying over a 30 week period we expect you to be finding about 5 hours per week per module between February and September if you are starting in May you are doing it in half the time and therefore you need to be able to find about 10 hours per week per module even rolled for so if you have 20 hours a week available take two modules in May and then I will say if you can show that you are actually not in full employment during this period and you have more than 20 hours a week you can devote to study we would let you take more modules but you will have to convince us that you really do not have time for that to understand that it is quite a big time commitment down there I am enrolled in the PG SERP poverty reduction starting in May upon completion what is the procedure for enrollment in the MSc this is another I think strength of our system is that it is very easy to upgrade from individual professional awards to PG SERP to MSc what you do is that you show that you have done fine in the course that you are enrolled for and then we will simply upgrade you at no cost to yourself to the next stage of the program and all the modules that you have completed will just be credited to the new program so if you have done four modules for the PG SERP I would like to continue to an MSc but you do not take the PG SERP certificate as an exit award you choose instead to carry your credits into an MSc and we upgrade you to an MSc registration so you would typically do it after the exams you would say here I am, I passed my modules can I switch to an MSc and if you have passed your modules we will say yes I will not start the MSc until the following year well the new study session only starts in February in Diana so you would start the next study session which is February as I have said when you register towards the end of the year we are looking to make it possible for you to get your course materials earlier than has been the case in the past so that you can do some self study but the official study session will not start until February so you are not missing out on the thing that is when everybody's next study session starts I have been given a conditional offer to enrol on the sustainable development MSc if a situation arises and I cannot complete all nine modules would I be able to receive a PG SERP or PG diploma if you have passed enough core and elective modules yes Rachel you can we call that an exit award so if you end your five years and you haven't been able to complete all the modules for whatever reason we will look to give you the highest exit award that you qualify for which could be a PG diploma could be a PG SERP if you are around your short of getting one of those we might also give you an additional year to complete an appropriate exit award so yes we are flexible that way as well as flexible in letting you move up from a PG SERP to MSc you can also take an exit award which is lower than your original if that is what you need to do I am not sure how fast I am getting through the questions but I will keep going as quick as I can here I will ask how many ECTS are awarded the MSc program and is there a presentation of the dissertation and if yes where does it take place right so we tend to talk about our modules in terms of what are called ECTS which are the UK credit system so our programs are 180CATS which is 90 ECTS so it is a 90 ECTS MSc program there is not a presentation of the dissertation you submit it online so you have a supervisor for the period of your dissertation you work with your supervisor you get feedback you get comments on your drafts etc and then you submit it online it is then marked independently by two markers again with external examiners seeing a sample of those to make sure that our marking is all fair but once your dissertation has got its mark as far as the dissertation is concerned you don't have to do a public defence of it for MSc and sustainable development in May which two modules should I do in a way you could talk to the module convener about that who has been daily but we would recommend that normally you do two of the core modules and I would probably suggest you to understanding sustainable development and one of the others in the core but you can choose which ones you want to do Dana is it possible to receive the study materials before May I know at this point it won't be but you will get them during May you will get them before the start of the actual study session about the 20th of May but you won't get them a lot before Dana when is registration for May so apply by 31st of March and then enrolment for individual modules is in mid-April I think the date on the slide that I showed you earlier is the 14th of April and then of course it takes a while to courier or on your packs out to you in different places but registration is in mid-April you'll see how many hours a week we expected to spend studying so I think I've covered that one but just to say it again if you're starting in May we expect you to be able to find about 10 hours per module per week so if you register for two modules you'll need to find about 20 hours per week for your studying in May if you're starting in February you'll have twice as long per week Venti again I'm still early in my career have you seen more people who do this do you generally suggest people get some experience in the field before they do a distance MSc actually we don't have a recommendation here Venti what I would say is that there's a difference between the demographic profile of students who study at distance and the demographic profile of students on campus students tend to be younger distance students often are mid-career they've done 10 to 15 years work in the field and actually the applied nature of our materials means that you are reflecting on stuff that you are encountering as you work quite often but it doesn't have to be that way we have a minority of our students who are in the 21 to 25 bracket and we have people who are looking to get into a career rather than people who are progressing through a career or looking to move on within it who are studying with us so every year we have people who start going pretty much straight from undergraduate and that certainly can be done but we find that the distance format works for people who as you get a bit further on in your career and you gain professional responsibilities and maybe a house and a family becomes more difficult to take a year out and study on campus and I think that's probably the main driver of why our demographic profile is different from on campus when does the enrollment for May students end so I just need to check up on this if you're saying when do you have to enroll by again it's application 31st of March and registering for modules in the middle of April I think it was 14th if you're saying when does the study session end it ends with the exam in the second part of September Joe when I called I was informed I'd be able to use a CERS library and I'd be given a letter to show the library yes Joe if you are based in UK or London are able to get to the library you can come and be given a letter and then you can use the library physically here similarly if you're in another country and you're visiting London you also are entitled to do that so yes that is the case and Joe as a SEDEP student you would contact our student support team SEDEP admin email address that you use for applications and other things and they can help you with that so Rena I'm enrolled for an MSc will I be able to ask for a PG CERC once I finish the required number of modules for job seeking before moving on to read for the rest so in the letter answer to that unfortunately is no in the University of London system so this is not just a SOAS information when you complete the PG certificate modules the first four modules you have a choice you either take the PG certificate as an exit award which means that's your registration with a ceasing or you proceed with your MSc in which case you don't receive a PG certificate so I'm afraid there are not intermediate awards in the University of London system you choose either I exit with my award or I continue studying towards a bigger award Yammer Greetings I need to bring my children with me for the final exams I've never had that question before Yammer but I'm not aware of there being childcare facilities at exam centres so you could ask University of London about that there is an email address which is something egug.exams at london.ac.me and then people at exam centres they run they prove and monitor exams at the entire University of London system including SEDEP they wouldn't be able to answer that you have to get childcare for the day of your exam Alan you've mentioned that MSc in climate change and development may begin in October but is the deadline for application also in March? No, the application will be near at the time Alan because we are still seeking that final approval which as I say we hope to get at the beginning of May for exactly how we're going to run the programme and we'll see how it goes and applications straight after that so watch the website for that but it's not going to be by March 31st can you pay by instalments? You pay by module so you do have to pay in full for each module that you take but if you take two modules in one year you just pay for those two and then you pay for the next modules the following year when you take those Can I take exams in different exam centres in the world? I'm in different locations yes you can take them in one year you might be in one country you take it in the exam centre in the city or cities whichever in the country you're in and the next year you may be in a different country and you can register to take your exams in a different location the important thing is the exam registration deadline is something like the 1st of August I believe for an exam in September so by that point you have to know which country you want to take your exam in and as long as you specify it on your application form that will be accommodated is it possible to complete the MSc in environmental management within two years? to complete our MSc's in two years not many students do it because it is plenty of work and as I've explained the hours required already not that many people have the hours necessary to do that if you were starting in February the way you would complete in two years is to take your four core modules and research methods in year one and you would then take your three optional modules and the dissertation in year two actually if you start in May you will have to take two and a half years and the reason for that is you have to complete research methods before you start the dissertation and research methods is one you can only register for in February so if you're looking to start in May I would look to finish in two and a half years which is still a good achievement do a couple of modules in May then in February do your other two core modules and research methods and if you want to probably also do one optional module that would look modules and then in your third year you do your dissertation and your two final elective modules and that will get you through in two and a half years Lindsay is attendance for online webinars and discussions compulsory every week? No so there's nothing compulsory about either the webinars or the discussions we encourage students to participate in both but the practicalities of the working and busy lives of our students mean very difficult to make it compulsory so no you can't join webinars if you can you contribute to discussion forums as you can as you wish so you're free at any time to post a question you're free to go and contribute to the discussions but we can't force you and we don't try Brenda can there be can one be able to pick any core modules to start with in particular order okay so each of our programs has specified core modules and a list of optional modules to take we don't mind which order you do them in we do generally recommend that you start with your core modules I'll explain an exception to that in just a second but the core modules you can do in any order and the electives you can do in any order so the one exception to that you will have seen and I've already mentioned earlier in this webinar that from time to time we announce the withdrawal of modules and then we may introduce new ones if we announce the withdrawal of a module and it's an optional module that you wanted to take we would encourage you to take it right at the start of your program so that you get to take the module that you want to take so even if it's an optional module we would encourage you to take it to the start so you can do that and then you can do your optional modules alongside it but you don't finish or you can do your core modules alongside it rather than insisting you do your core modules first and then you miss an option that you really wanted for the MSc in Sustainable Development Jasmine can I take only one module in May or is there a minimum of two no you're absolutely fine to take one module in May and in May that's still 10 hours a week you're looking for so I would expect many students starting in May to just take the one module and it's only those who really want to get moving fast through their studies who I would recommend take two Ben to just wondering how employers especially international organizations perceive a distance learning degree so all I can say there Ben to us we have lots of students in international organizations as per my one of my slides earlier so they are very familiar with them I think our program has been running for 30 years it's highly respected and in lots of international organizations that are listed and in others there are plenty of students with said distance learning MSc's so they're well known and they are examined to exactly the same standards of rigor as any on campus university of London programs are exactly equivalent and I think many of the international organizations understand that through experience of seeing their staff take these programs Courtney okay two questions here how many students are averaging role in MSc agricultural economics each year the answer to that one is about 25 or so each year are there resources for career development networking with former graduates of the program or other opportunities there are possibilities to be part of the so alumnus network there are opportunities obviously for getting to know your current students with the alumni network is something that we are working on I think we could do more than we currently do but there is a fantastic resource of people out there who are said graduates and other service graduates and looking for ways of better linking you in with them I'm engaged in environmental management certification business I was registered okay I'm interested in your MSc in environmental management but I don't have a bachelor degree so this is a question we get right from time to time generally if you don't have a bachelor's degree but you can show that you have some professional experience and things relevant which suggest that you probably could study with us we would encourage you to register for one or two of our modules as individual professional awards and if you do find in those we will upgrade you to an MSc so we are unlikely to give you registration direct to the MSc if you don't have a bachelor's but we would consider you for one of the lower awards based on your professional experience and then if you do find in it it's a low cost upgrade to proceed to the MSc Brenda does set up do summer school answer at the moment no we don't have any negotiations discussions with us about some of our modules next year for summer school as a pilot but that's not officially announced yet so the current practices it's all at distance watch this space you see another exam centres in every country I believe the answer to that is yes there might be some islands somewhere where that's not true the University of London international programmes website has a list of exam centres that you can go and look at and I think you'll find wherever it is you're interested there will be an exam centre Cameron do you have to take one module selected from another programme for the full MSc no you don't so in some of our programmes it says that you are allowed to take a free choice of elective module from anywhere in set up programmes that's true for agricultural economics environmental economics and environmental management but you certainly don't have to you can just take it all from within the list of the programme that you're interested in for sustainable development and poverty reduction it says you can take a free choice from within that particular programme because there's quite a large selection within both the poverty reduction and environmental management programmes but again you don't have to take one out of your chosen specialist stream if you're doing poverty reduction or sustainable development you can just take a module from you can just take four elective modules from your specialist stream if you want to actually we're getting towards the end here Mustafa I've been working for six years in natural resource management in English environment and I've studied English individual courses so I might fit to postgraduate certificate so Mustafa we would look at your undergraduate qualifications and we certainly take your experience into account it counts positively when we look at your applications I would have thought if you have an undergraduate degree and you have your experience that you've listed that you would have a problem getting registration for postgraduate certificate in environmental management Sophie is the online learning environment compatible with all devices now Sophie that's a technical question I'm not sure that I can give you a totally reliable answer there can I suggest that you post that question at soas.ac.uk that's our support student support email saidadmin at soas.ac.uk and they will forward it to our technical people and I would suggest that you say which devices you're interested in and they can confirm for you and I hope the answer is yes for you Farah you've now gone on and had a look at some of the exam centres and you say that in Canada you see that some of them are actually universities are we affiliated with them so I think the answer is no we're not affiliated with them what happens is the University of London international programmes they are responsible for maintaining a network of exam centres all over the world and they work with willing partners wherever they are and it's on a purely contractual basis the University of London international programmes has a contract with that university to act as an exam centre but I think that's the entirety of the relationship there isn't an affiliation that goes beyond that this question about payment of instalments as I said again you pay per module when you're paying for a module you do have to pay for the full module that's £1,050 but you're only paying for each module that you're doing at the moment as far as I'm aware there's no facility for paying part of a module fee at once part of a module fee at one point and then topping it up you do have to find the full £1,050 for your module when you want to study that module I hope to start MSC in Environmental Management in two years however are you able to pause your studies so Valerie you will be given registration for five years and you can pace your studies at the pace you want so if you take a number of modules in May and the coming February and then having completed those you need to pause and not register for anything for the following year that's entirely up to you as long as you get to the end within your five years you have lots of flexibility in how you do that so the basic answer to your question is yes Cameron are there opportunities for face to face time with shooters if we find ourselves able to get to London so limited you can sometimes see if you're passing through and you'd like to come and visit somebody you can come and do that you won't get one-to-one tuition during that time but you can come and put a face to a name and maybe you will have some particular questions that you want to ask we do get students who come through London and say could I meet up with such a person and if possible we will do that in the same way as distance learning enables students all over the world to study both our conveners and our tutors are actually quite dispersed around UK so we have to arrange that on a case by case basis because it's not always a case that they'll be in London when you come through again sedepadmin at saras.ac.uk would be the place to put your request and try to arrange it you see how many students enroll each year in MSc Environmental Management about 25 to 30 each year on that program as we had that question earlier for ag economics let me tell you that for sustainable development that's our largest program so 60 to 70 each year on that maybe 50 students each year on poverty reduction and then probably 30 25 to 30 on environmental economics environmental management 25 or so on agricultural economics each year Lucille can we pay in advance for modules we can take later yes you can if that helps you manage your finance is better or if your employer is paying and wants to make the payment early yes you are allowed to do that so you've registered and been given our conditional offer can I enroll and pay for the two modules I plan to take this May now do I have to wait for the registration period to end so do you know I don't actually have that question I'm really sorry but if you again email saidadmin at saras.ac.uk they will be able to answer that question for you I would hope that we're able to help you early but they will be able to confirm that okay I just seen that having been looking at just at your questions throughout we've now come to half past one we've come to the end of the questions I hope that has been useful for everybody I see some people are saying thanks and logging out well thank you very much for joining us and if you do have any further questions let me just repeat one last time saidadmin at saras.ac.uk is the email address to put your further questions and I look forward to interacting with many of you on our programs in due course thanks very much bye