Creative Enterprise Professional Diploma

Applicants for this course could come from a wide variety of creative disciplines ranging from Graphic Design and Photography, through to Illustration, Fine Art, Participatory Arts and Creative Health.

This course is ideal for creatives who already know how to use their arts practice and are now aiming to establish a self-employed creative career.

This course does not include tuition for any practical creative skills. It is designed to enable people to use their existing creative skills to develop a viable self-employed creative career.

The course comprises of three core Units:

Unit 1: The Creative Entrepreneur

This Unit introduces learners to the requisite skills needed to start a creative business. It includes research and development of business skills, considers aspects of the legal and regulatory frameworks of creative business practice and looks at ways to position your own creative brand in a crowded marketplace. This unit is assessed as a pass or fail.

Unit 2: The Creative Practitioner

The Creative Practitioner unit is a practical project that supports learners in trialing and testing their own creative business ideas. It is a safe space to soft launch business ideas and tests for viability by critically analysing their success. Additionally, the Creative Practitioner Unit allows learners to begin developing a valuable network of business contacts useful for continued employment. This unit is assessed as a pass or fail.

Unit 3: The Creative Enterprise

Unit 3 builds on the research and development of Unit 1 and the test trading experiences of Unit 2, to develop a fully resolved business plan that will enable students to begin trading as a freelance creative practitioner. This final unit is assessed as either a Pass, Merit or Distinction.

Applicants should be aged 18 or over and have a solid background in their own creative practice. Applicants are likely to have completed a full Level 3 qualification or degree in their own area of specialism, although experienced adult applicants will be considered at interview.

Applicants should be fully committed to starting their own self-employed creative enterprise and will be expected to discuss this, along with their portfolio of creative work at the interview stage.

The course is delivered through a series of professional presentations and discussions, skills workshops and lectures. It is assessed through a mixture of written research assignments, practical trading assignments, professional pitches and presentations.

Students are most likely to enter full time self-employment after this course as this is what the Professional Diploma in Creative Enterprise is designed to do.

Alternatively, some learners may choose to complete further study at Level 5 alongside employment to further develop their creative career.

As a City of Bristol College student, you may incur additional costs to attend your course. For example, you may likely need to pay for travel and stationery. Many courses offer learning opportunities that you may need to pay for. This may include things like study visits and visiting speakers. There may be some additional costs depending on the nature of your business idea when trialling and test trading. We will let you know in advance if there will be additional costs.

If you are on a limited income, you may be able to receive help from our Learner Support Funding