How our courses work

Join our CIPR courses when the time is right for you. Decide how quickly you want to complete or take advantage of the full one or two years allowed.

Our ‘join anytime’ blended learning is super flexible and comes with lots of support.

How our CIPR courses work

Join anytime: You can enrol as soon as you are ready to start studying.

Study at your own pace: You decide how quickly you want to complete, or you can take advantage of the one or two years allowed for CIPR courses.

PR Academy Study Hub: Our study hub has been designed specially for our PR and communication courses with easy to follow lessons, video content, guided reading (all reading materials are provided) and some have live workshop sessions.

Live workshop sessions: Our live workshops are interactive sessions where a tutor will lead discussions about the topic. They run regularly so you can book these on the dates that works best for you.

Assignment submission dates: There are four times a year when the CIPR takes in work for its exam board, these are usually January, April, July and October. You just need to decide which you want to aim for and if you change your mind or work gets in the way, just opt for the next one as long as you’re still within the time to complete.

Hear from others

Discover the benefits of applying theory to practice from Leila.

https://vimeo.com/753946253

Discover more about how our courses work

Ann Pilkington, co-founder of PR Academy explains how our courses work, demonstrates our Study Hub and explains the resources and support you will receive. Also hear from members of the PR Academy alumni.

https://vimeo.com/882107294?share=copy

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They aren't heavily academic. We still discuss theory because that’s what makes us better practitioners, but we show how to apply it in practice. We call it applied learning. The assignments are mostly in the style of business writing rather than academic essays or dissertations.
It isn’t essential, for example, you can study while on a career break. For some of the higher level courses, you will need experience. For example, for CIPR Diploma level courses you need to have a minimum of five years experience and reasonably senior level. Some of the assignments are designed to be based on your work but if you aren’t currently employed a tutor can help you with other options.
It varies according to the course and the stage you are at. As a very general guide, think about allowing between two and four hours a week, but this can increase when you are doing an assignment. For most courses, there is a maximum time that you have to complete the course and hand in your work so you can decide if you want to take the maximum amount of time and spread the learning over longer, or do it more quickly which will mean more hours each week. For example, the CIPR Professional PR Diploma can be completed comfortably in about ten months. The short CIPR diplomas in about six months and the Foundation in about two months. But all can be done more quickly if you have the time.
We offer plenty of support. Many courses offer individual tutorials that can be booked. The course leader is easily contactable and there is always someone in the office who can help with day to day queries.
Yes, most of our students are working full time and many have family commitments too. While the courses are demanding – they wouldn’t be of value if they weren’t – the pace of learning and the flexible options make it possible.