Short courses for kids and teens

Useful information

UAL Short Courses offer a wide range of creative courses for kids and teens aged 11 to 18 years old across a variety of creative subject areas. Courses take place face to face at UAL Colleges in London or online.

Choosing a short course

Our courses are designed to fit all levels of ability; all that is required is an interest in the subject area and desire to learn. Tutors are experienced in teaching younger learners, students from a variety of backgrounds and with different support needs.

There is no application process for Short Courses; places are offered first come first served. We recommend early booking to avoid disappointment. Popular courses during summer can become fully booked as early as March!

Please note if you can no longer see a specific date for booking this means it is no longer available. Please check out the short course schedule to find another suitable course or contact our Customer Service Team who can assist.

Courses are split in two age brackets:

11 to 15 year olds
16 to 18 year olds

Students attending a short course must be of the appropriate age. This is highlighted in the course title.

Additional requests

At the time of booking, we ask parents or guardians to highlight any additional information or learning requirements you would like our team to be aware of so that we can provide the best experience possible.

You can also contact our Customer Service Team prior to booking to discuss specific requests and to understand more about our learning environment.

Food allergies

It is important that our Customer Service Team are informed of any serious allergies that we need to be aware of. This information will be shared with fellow students and tutors. We are unable to guarantee a ‘free-from’ environment in our canteens, but students are free to eat in other areas.

Safeguarding

We commit ourselves to upholding the utmost level of child protection and safeguarding of our students.

We require all tutors to have enhanced clearance via the DBS (Disclosure and Barring Service).

Courses for 11 to 15 year olds

Students aged under 16 years old are not permitted to leave campus during their course. This includes requests from parents or guardians to take them off site at lunch time. Lunchtimes are subject to change, and it creates a united environment for our younger learners if they spend the day together.

Please ensure learners bring lunch, snacks and water.

When a course finishes at 3.30pm, our duty of care finishes for the day. We do not monitor students after this time or sign them out of our buildings, but they are welcome to wait in the reception or public areas of the Colleges for someone to pick them up.

Lunchtimes

Students aged 16 to 18 are permitted to leave the site at lunchtime and there are a variety of local shops and cafes where food can be purchased if they wish to do so.

Learning expectations and course content

We run a range of portfolio-based courses. The purpose of these courses is to explore the idea generation and design process. Students will come away with work that is suitable for a portfolio and an understanding of the foundations required to build their own.

Please note, the outcome of portfolio-based courses is not to come away with a finished portfolio.

Day One of many courses may involve a lot of experimentation. We often encourage students to use found and recycled materials during this exploration phase. This enables students to ‘loosen’ up, play and explore new materials with a focus on sustainability.

Short Course tutors cannot provide letters of recommendation. Parents and students should not communicate directly with the tutor outside of class time. All communications must be made via the UAL Short Course Customer Service Team.

Preparation for online courses

Ensure a stable internet connection - we recommend a minimum of 2 Mbps download, and 1 Mbps upload, faster if possible. You can test your network speed here - https://www.speedtest.net
An up-to-date web browser (we recommend Chrome)
Have a webcam, microphone, and headphones (the built-in microphone in your device would also be fine)
Use the Google Chrome web browser for optimal performance

Our experienced online UAL Short Courses team is available to provide support if you come across any technical issues when accessing your online short course. You can also use the VLE forums for tutor feedback and peer reviews.

Digital badges and certificates

Short course students will earn a digital badge on completion of a course. The more courses you take the more badges you will earn.

We work with Accredible to issue digital badges and certificates for short course students. Digital badges are a great way to celebrate your achievements and stand out from the crowd.

Each digital badge contains unique metadata relating to the course studied. This can include skills acquired, topics covered, and hours studied during the course.

Badges can be shared in digital portfolios, used on CVs and added to social media profiles such as LinkedIn. They also make a great addition to university applications and are supported by the UCAS platform.

Free resources

We have developed an exciting range of Future Creatives activities for kids and teens. These activities are ideal for young creatives aged between 7 to 15 years old to explore different styles of art and experiment with new techniques.
Explore our range of fun art club activities for kids and teens.