Writing style guide

Consistency across all INTO University Partnerships materials is vital to maintain the status of our brand. This guide covers formatting, layout, and style standards for INTO digital and print materials in the UK, US and Australia.

Language

The language for global All Brands materials is American English.

Where microsites exist, use the spelling of the country where the university is located - for digital and print materials. For brands that remain on IS.com, (currently LON, MAN, UOM, UWA) American English should be used – but British English for UK partners' toolkit materials/other assets and Australian English for UWA. 

UK partners: British English

UWA: Australian English

US partners: American English

Common words

For local language style guides you can refer to our Wiki.

INTO, university, center and academic

Agents

Refer to as ‘education counsellor’ (UK, Australia) or ‘education counselor’ (US).

Capitalization (of degrees, pathways, courses, programs, faculties etc.)

• Degrees, programs, pathways and courses: Title Case e.g. International Year One in Engineering; BSc (Hons) Chemical Engineering; Academic English. 

• Modules (UK)/courses (US)/units (Australia): Title Case, e.g. Introduction to the Study of Business. 

• Schools/faculties: Title Case e.g. the School of Natural Sciences.   

• Subject areas: lower case. 

• Subject rankings: Title Case for the subject area as the ranking is a proper noun e.g. ‘World top 100 for Mechanical Engineering’. 

Center

Where possible, refer to ‘the INTO Center’ in full, and – in this case – capitalize both ‘INTO’ and ‘Center’.

A capital C isn’t necessary when referring to ‘centers’ generally or ‘the center’ as a location (e.g. ‘the staff at the center’), but ‘the Center’ as a collective should be capitalized (e.g. speak to the Center).

When referring to UK centers in American English, ‘INTO Centre’ becomes ‘INTO Center’ – except when writing the full name of a center with the word ‘Centre’ in it, e.g. INTO London World Education Centre. 

Avoid using a center’s acronym (if the university uses one e.g. UEA) in an H1, instead introducing it in the first instance in the body copy, e.g. Header: ‘Scholarships at INTO University of East Anglia’; body copy: ‘…for students with an offer to study at INTO University of East Anglia (UEA)...’

Courses or programs

In the UK, ‘programme’ is the umbrella term for all academic programs and English language courses.  

Aim to consistently use ‘programme’ – rather than introducing new terminology (such as ‘academic pathway’ or ‘academic programme’) which may be confusing to the user.  We use ‘pathway’ and ‘degree’ to distinguish between these two program types.  

Use ‘course’ for English language courses including Academic English, General English, Pre-sessional English and Study Abroad with English. 

Refer to different program lengths by term length rather than using ‘standard’, 'intensive' or 'extensive'. E.g. '2-5 term study options to suit different English language levels.' not 'Intensive and extended program options to suit different English language levels.'

In the US, 'programs' is used for Pathway, Academic English, General English and Study Abroad with English. When referring to programs in the plural, use 'Undergraduate Pathway programs,' not 'Undergraduate Pathways.'

Degrees

Refer to degree programs as:

UK/Australia: undergraduate or postgraduate  

US: undergraduate or graduate

Bachelor’s or Master’s can be used online for SEO purposes.  

In a heading or table: BA, BSc, BAEcon, BEng, LLB, MA, MSc, MEng, MChem, LLM, PhD etc.

Degree classifications

UK: Use ‘First Class Honours degree’, ‘Upper Second Class Honours degree’, etc.

Referred to as ‘1st’, ‘2:1’ and ‘2:2’ online for SEO purposes.

Direct entry

UK: This is more of an internal term and to be avoided in sentences such as ‘the International Year One offers direct entry to Year 2 of your degree’ when just ‘…offers entry to Year 2…’ communicates the same message.

Honors

Upper case ‘H’. BSc (Hons), with a space between the two abbreviations.

‘Honours’ for UK/Australian print materials.

'Honors' for US print materials.

International Study Centre  

For the first mention, use the full name: [university name] International Study Centre  

For subsequent mentions on the same page (brochure/website) or within the same asset (video/social post), use any of the following as appropriate to the context and space available:    

• International Study Centre  

• study centre  

• centre.   

We don’t use the abbreviation ‘ISC’ – unless for social media tags or SEO.   

For some partners (detailed below) we can use an abbreviated form of the university name followed by ‘International Study Centre’, but not when the abbreviated form is also the name of the city, e.g. Newcastle. 

Partner-specific guidelines:

UK university partners 

• City St George’s International Study Centre
  Don’t include ‘University of London’ within the centre’s name. However, the first mention of the university’s name should be ‘City St George’s, University of London’ with subsequent mentions being ‘City St George’s’ or ‘the university’.  

• INTO Manchester in partnership with The University of Manchester
  Don’t reference ‘International Study Centre’, only use ‘study centre’ or ‘centre’.  

• Queen’s University Belfast International Study Centre
  Just as we sometimes refer to the university as ‘Queen’s’, we can similarly use 'Queen’s International Study Centre’ – but only after the first mention of the full centre name. 

• University of East Anglia International Study Centre
  Just as we sometimes use the university’s abbreviation ‘UEA’, we can similarly use 'UEA International Study Centre’ – but only after the first mention of the full centre name. Don’t use ‘UEA ISC’. 

The naming of INTO Choice centers remains as outlined below in the style guide.   

INTO

When referring to non-center specific products or services (e.g. All Brands assets), we can continue to use ‘INTO’ (known internally as ‘big INTO'). E.g ‘contact an INTO education counselor’ or ‘Why study with INTO?’.  

Refer to INTO in the singular e.g. ‘INTO is’ not ‘INTO are’.

For corporate materials, refer to ‘INTO University Partnerships’ in full in the first instance. 

INTO Choice center

Used for INTO Manchester and INTO London.

Other qualifications

GCSEs, AS level, A levels.

Progression

Aim to use 'continue to' or 'secure your place at x' rather than using 'progress to' - as 'progress' is more internal terminology.

Undergraduate/postgraduate/graduate

Lower case, one word without a hyphen. 

University

In the first instance, refer to the university in full, e.g. ‘Suffolk University offers...’.

References without the university's name take lower case 'u' e.g. 'the university's facilities...'; collective references are also lower case e.g. 'universities'.

Only abbreviate a name if the university refers to itself in the abbreviated format.

Try to avoid using a university’s acronym in an H1, instead introducing it in the first instance in the body copy, e.g. Header: ‘About the University of East Anglia’; body copy: ‘…preparing you for degrees at the University of East Anglia (UEA)…’ 

University name

Only use 'The' if this forms part of the university's name, e.g. 'The University of Manchester', 'The University of Western Australia' but 'University of Exeter' or 'the University of Exeter…' if talking about the institution within a sentence. 

University Study Centre

These in-market centers are partnerships between local colleges and INTO to deliver our in-market programs.

• Full name is: University Study Centre, Dubai (not University Study Centre in Dubai, for example).

• Can also refer to it as 'the University Study Centre' or 'the centre'.

• Must only refer to 'International Foundation/the International Foundation' – not International Foundation program/s or pathway/s.

Years  

When writing generally about the years of programs, use lower case, e.g. ‘in the first year’.

When writing about a specific year of the program, use an upper case ‘Y’ followed by a figure, e.g. ‘Progress to Year 2 of an undergraduate degree’. 

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Rankings and accolades 

When using rankings in content, check they are:

• the most recent version – see exception below

• no more than three years old, where possible

• from a reputable, recognized source

• presented/worded correctly – see guidance below

• used consistently e.g. don’t use a QS 2024 and a QS 2025 subject ranking in the same piece of content – only use the latest.

There is an exception to using the most recent version of a ranking: we may use a slightly older version if the most recent version is significantly lower and there isn’t a suitable alternative – noting that we can’t use two different years of the same source in one set of assets.

Presentation/wording

Using numbers in rankings

Round up to the nearest five (below 20), nearest 10 (over 20) or multiples of 25. For example:

• 11th would be ‘top 15’

• 16th would be ‘top 20’

• 22nd would be ‘top 25’

• 42nd would be ‘top 50’.

There are some exceptions: The University of Manchester currently uses ‘world top 35’ in its tagline; The University of Western Australia uses ‘world top 100’ although its actual rank is 77th in the latest QS rankings.

For rankings 1, 2 or 3, you can use 1st, 2nd, 3rd or ‘world/UK top 3’, ‘UK top university for…’, ‘World’s best…’ etc.

For UK and Australian rankings, we tend to use 1st, 2nd, world top 10 etc. For US rankings, the ‘#’ is often used: ‘#2 Best State for Jobs’.

Global/country-specific rankings

• World top 100 for… – not ‘top 100 in the world for…’

• UK top 10 for… – not ‘top 10 in the UK for…’

• Top 200 universities worldwide

There may be instances where you need to be specific, or it reads better by detailing the ranking ahead of the location e.g. ‘1st in Western Australia for…’ – this is also fine.

Subject rankings

• UK top 10 for Accounting and Finance

• World top 100 for Civil Engineering

• 15+ subjects in the world top 50

When listing multiple subject rankings, you may need to use a semi colon for clarity e.g. ‘UK top 3 for Accounting and Finance; Business and Management; and Marketing’.

Research rankings

• 99% of research is world-leading or internationally excellent

• World top 10 for research/research excellence/research intensity in Psychology

Academic/employability rankings

• 90% of students gained grades A*–A in [year]

• 97% of graduates achieve a 1st, 2:1 or 2:2 (Based on International Study Centre students graduating from [university] in 2024) – instead of saying ‘graduated with a 2:2 or above’

• 91% of all pathway students continued to [university] in [academic year] / 91% of our eligible students secured their place at [university] in [academic year e.g. 2025/26]

• 92% of graduates are in work or further study within 15 months

• UK top 5 for Graduate Prospects in Computer Science

• Top 10 UK university ‘most targeted’ by leading employers

• 1st in the Russell Group for graduate employment

Progression

We have 3 main data points for progression, and suggested wording for reflecting this data:

1. passed > xx% of our students successfully passed their programme [if talking about all, or use individual programme type e.g. International Foundation, if specific] in [year] 

2. eligible to progress, of those who passed > xx% of our eligible students secured their place at [university] in [year]

3. eligible students (so those in point 2) who actually progressed > xx% of all pathway [or individual programme type if specific] students continued to [university] in [year] (of those who passed) 

Student satisfaction

• 91% overall student satisfaction

• 94% student satisfaction with support – exception: UWA College uses ‘94% support satisfaction/learning satisfaction’

• 95% of students agree that the INTO center made them feel welcome

Sources

All rankings should always be accompanied by a source. This could either be included in brackets after the ranking or indicated by a footnote and detailed at the bottom of the page. 

Frequently used rankings

These are some of the most common rankings we use, and how we word them:

We sometimes use a website for stats, in which case state the website name and year the information was published – or if not available, the year you accessed it – as the source e.g. ‘Numbeo.com 2024’.

Punctuation

Acronyms

Write in full in the first instance followed by the acronym in brackets. The acronym can then be used in subsequent mentions.

Exceptions are if the acronym is better known than what it stands for e.g. PDF.

Ampersand (&)

We try to avoid using ampersands, unless:

• they are part of a name e.g. H&M

• there are character limits and an ampersand will save space e.g. in meta data, certain fields in Contentful etc

• a university uses them within a degree name for clarity e.g. BSc (Hons) Accounting and Finance & Business and Management.  

Capitals

In the majority of cases, use capital letters only for the initial letter or for proper nouns - also known as Sentence case, e.g.:

• Students can choose from the city centre or the Knowledge Quarter.

• Students on business pathways can choose two modules. Students on the Psychology pathway can choose three modules.

This includes headers and buttons, which should always be Sentence case.

Title Case (capitals at the start of each word except prepositions) should only be used in certain circumstances e.g. proper nouns such as:

• Programme Manager

• Alan Turing Institute

• Home Office.

Use of Title Case in academic proper nouns can vary. See INTO, university, center and academic section for more information.

URLs should be entirely lowercase (including within CTAs), except when following a footnote symbol for sources/caveats, which should follow Sentence case, e.g.:

• * Discoveruni.org.uk

• * Data from discoveruni.org.uk

• For more information, visit:

• intostudy.com

• Scan the QR codes or visit intostudy.com.

Colons

Use to introduce a list. Can be used between two sentences, when the second statement follows the first. E.g. ‘there are two libraries: the Law Library and the Medical Library’.

Never follow a colon with a dash or hyphen (:-). A semicolon is not a substitute for a colon.

Commas

Use to separate lists or in longer sentences to aid the reader/avoid confusion.

Use two commas when inserting a clause in the middle of a sentence, e.g. ‘for further information, or to arrange a visit, please email us’.

Lists do not need a comma before the final ‘and’, unless needed to add clarity, e.g. ‘topics include economics, management and leadership, and marketing’.

Contractions

An apostrophe is used when shortening and combining two words to make a contraction. E.g. ‘you’ll’; ‘we’ll’; ‘don’t’. We use contractions to make our writing less formal and sound more natural. 

Dashes

There are three dashes: hyphen (-), en dash (–) and em dash (—).

Use the en dash for ranges, e.g. p27–39. There are no spaces either side of the dash.

En dashes can be used in place of brackets or commas, e.g. ‘the two campuses in Exeter – Streatham and Penryn  – are close to the town center’. 

An en dash can be used to link two parts of a sentence in place of a colon, e.g. ‘it also has its own museum – the Center for Visual Arts’.

Do not use the en dash with the words ‘from’ or ‘between’; use the words ‘to’ and ‘and’ e.g. ‘the program runs from 05 May to 20 June’.

Create an en dash by pressing ‘Alt’ and the hyphen key, or ‘Cmd/Ctrl’ and the minus sign.

The em dash is used in American English, in the same instances as the en dash is used in British English e.g. 'Getting to know your peers—90% of the student population lives on campus.'

Exclamation mark

Do not use, other than very sparingly to add tone to informal content, e.g. blogs or student testimonials.

City does not use exclamation marks at all.

Forward slash

No gaps before or after a forward slash, e.g. ‘business/maths programs’.

Full stops

Don't use at the end of headings or subheadings, unless the heading requires the punctuation for impact e.g. 'From Manchester to the best UK universities. Guaranteed.'

Use only one space after a full stop, not two.

Don't use in rankings e.g. UK world top 50 university (QS World University Rankings 2026)
Don't use in rankings with a header either e.g.
Career support
UK top 3 for careers service
(StudentCrowd Awards 2025)

Do use in USPs that have a header and a supporting sentence e.g.
Career mentoring
One-to-one support from a professional in your chosen field.

Hyphens

Use hyphens:

 • to separate identical letters in a compound word: co-operate, co-ordinate, re-emerge etc.  

• in compound adjectives: three-year program; up-to-date information; career-focused courses. Note: ‘career-focused programs’ but ‘our programs are career focused’.

Do not use a hyphen when a word ending ‘-ly’ is before an adjective/adverb, e.g. highly committed student; globally recognized university.

Parentheses (brackets)

Use round brackets for explanations, e.g. ‘an IELTS score of 5.5 (with a minimum of 5.0 in any subskill) or equivalent’.

When writing a complete sentence within brackets, punctuation goes within the brackets. (This is a great example of this.) If the text in brackets is part of a sentence (like here), it goes outside.

Quotation marks

Use double quotation marks (“) for speech, with single quotes (‘) for quoted words inside the quotation. Use single quotes for introducing a new idea or concept.

Semi colons

Indicates a pause shorter than a colon but longer than a comma. It splits phrases that are grammatically complete but are close in meaning but lack a conjunction. Can also be used to separate items in a complicated list, for clarity.

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Formatting and layout

Bullet points

We use two types of bulleted list.

If bullets form a list introduced by a colon, each bullet point starts with a lower-case letter (except for proper nouns) and there is no punctuation at the end of the lines except for the final point which ends in a full stop e.g. 

The sports facilities include:

• tennis courts

• football pitches

• Les Mills dance studios. 

If the bullet stands alone as individual sentences or multiple sentences within a bullet, each sentence starts in a capital and ends in a full stop e.g.

Email addresses

Do not add a full stop to an email at the end of a sentence. If the email is a call to action, use a colon to introduce it, e.g. ‘For more information, email: admissions@intoglobal.com’.

If the email is part of a sentence, you don’t need a colon, e.g. ‘for further information, email admissions@intoglobal.com’.

Footnotes/caveats

Try to remove the need for footnotes where possible e.g. on web pages, emails etc. Instead, either try to integrate the footnote into the copy, or consider if you really need to include it.

If footnotes are definitely needed, only use superscript numbers (not symbols) to link to the footnote/caveat.

The superscript number should fall within the punctuation e.g. Guaranteed progression[1].

The number in square brackets indicates to the designers that this should be a superscript number.

Hashtags

Always use capitals for INTO e.g. #INTOStudy, #INTOalumni, #helloINTO

Pagination

Write ‘page’ in full and lower case. In tables, you can use ‘p’, e.g. ‘p5’. Use figures and an en dash for ranges, e.g. pages 23–27.

Postal addresses

Only include commas in an address when the address is on one line, e.g. INTO University Partnerships, One Gloucester Place, Brighton BN1 4AA. 

When the address is over different lines, do not include commas at the end of each line.

References

Use single quotation marks to reference publication titles e.g. ‘The Daily Rag’.

Regions/compass points

Lower case and hyphenated between compass points and used adjectivally, e.g. south London; south-east England etc.

But upper case for geographical regions: South East Asia; Middle East; the South West etc. 

Spaces

Use only one space after a full stop, not two.

Telephone numbers

Use the international format for telephone numbers (unless addressing a local audience).

If the number is longer than six digits, split it in a logical place: +1 813 905 4686; +44 (0)1273 876040.

Web addresses

When writing web addresses, don’t include ‘http://’ if the address begins ‘www’; and for all web addresses beginning ‘www’, you can also leave this off.

Do not add a full stop when the web address is at the end of a sentence.

If an address is a CTA and not part of a full sentence, use a colon to introduce it, e.g. ‘For more information, visit: intostudy.com’. If it is part of a sentence, you don’t need a colon, e.g. ‘apply online at intostudy.com/apply or download our application form’.

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Numbers

Dates

For the UK/Australia, write as ‘date month year’ e.g. 03 March 2020.

If the day is needed, don’t include a comma. In dates and prices, e.g. Mon 03 Jan 2020–Fri 21 Aug 2020.

For the US, write as ‘month date year’ eg. March 03, 2020

If the day is needed, don’t include a comma. In dates and prices, eg. Mon Jan 03 2020–Fri 21 Aug 2020.

Months and days

For the US, it should be written out in full. Can be abbreviated only when space does not permit. When an abbreviation is needed, it should be shortened to three letters only:

Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec

Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu, Fri, Sat, Sun

Measurements

Use the metric system for weights and measurements, with a conversion if helpful to the reader. Use miles (written in full) for distances, followed by a conversion to km in brackets.

Write meters in full rather than using ‘m’ to avoid confusion with the shortened million.

Money  

Display using the minimal number of decimal places, e.g. ‘$55’ not ‘$55.00’.

When referring to millions or billions, don’t abbreviate but write in full e.g. ‘£1 million investment’.

For Australia, use 'AUD' to make clear you're using Australian dollars: AUD $16,995.

Numerals

Digital/social: always use numerals for scanability.

Print: spell out numbers one to nine; use numerals from 10 to 999,999. Use commas in numbers over 1,000.

Exceptions are:

• page numbers  

• in tables  

• across number ranges (e.g. 3–25)  

• in rankings, stats numbers can be written as 1st, 2nd, 5th, top 5 etc.  

• when used in reference to: part, semester, year, term, module or tier.

For millions and billions, write the full word, e.g. ‘The city has a population of 5 million’.

When talking about 'more than', use the '+' symbol in callouts to save space e.g. '4,500+ global industry partners working on real-world challenges'. In body copy, both 'more than' and '+' can be used e.g. 'With 15+ years’ experience of finding universities...' or '...professional connections to more than 4,500 industry partners...'.

Percentages

Use the % sign rather than ‘per cent’ with no space between the figure and sign, e.g. 75%.

Times

Use the 12-hour clock and include am/pm with no space after the number, and a full stop dividing the hour and minutes, e.g. 8.30am.

Years

UK: 2026/27 (using a forward slash between the years).
Australia's academic year is the same as a calendar year, so a date range isn't usually needed.

For US:

• Internal use: 2324 or 2023-24

• External use: 2023–2024 (using an en-dash between the years)

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Lists and tables

Module/degree/program lists

List in alphabetical order.

Tables  

Table headings should be in sentence case.

Universities

When listing universities, list in alphabetical order by location e.g. Abertay University, University of Aberdeen, Cardiff University.

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Quotes and captions

Student quotes

Include the following information: student’s first name and country of origin. 

For Asian students who adopt an English name, their first name should follow in brackets.

Student journey

Center-specific – digital/print:

[Name], [Country]

[Job Title] at [Company]

[INTO Program] > [Degree Title]

All Brands/Choice – digital/print:

[Name], [Country]

[Job Title] at [Company]

[INTO Program] at [INTO Center] > [Degree] at [University]

Only include the information appropriate to the student’s stage of their journey. So, if they haven’t yet progressed, only include the [INTO Program] beneath their name and country information.

Additional degrees (e.g. a Master's) or work placements can be added if relevant.

Newton A level Programme – digital:

[Name], [Country]

[A level results e.g. A* A* A A] in A levels > [Degree Title] at [University]

Newton A level Programme – print:  

[Name], [Country]  

Progressed to [degree] at [university]  

Achieved grades: [grades e.g. A* A* A A]   

Website testimonials

Add 'Pathway:' and 'Degree:' to the fields displaying this information in a student's bio.

For iCAS programmes in testimonials, we show a student's study bio like this: 
Programme: BSc (Hons) Psychology with International Foundation 

(We don’t use Pathway/Degree as we do for students studying a standalone pathway and continuing to a degree.)  

Print content

Use the arrow symbol to show the timeline of study when writing content in a Word document. The design team will know to show this visually when designing the page.

For the INTO Program, there is no need to detail the exact pathway, just the program type e.g. International Foundation. 

Academic quotes

For staff quotes, include the following information: full name, position [in Title Case and bold], center/university name.

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Digital content

Working with UX, we're developing our content to be consistent and user friendly. Some of the changes we're implementing across our digital content include:

CTA buttons

'Apply today' – not 'Apply now'

Programme pages (online), key information 

Have one clear message per bullet rather than trying to combine. Ensure they are simplified. 

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SEO

Optimize the content structure

Follow the headings hierarchy (H1, H2, H3). Each page should have one H1 (the main title) and use H2s/H3s for subheadings.

Keep the paragraphs short and scannable. Aim for 2-4 sentences per paragraph.

Use bullet points and numbered lists. This improves readability and helps search engines understand content hierarchy.

Write SEO-friendly H1 titles, meta titles and meta descriptions

Note: an H1 title is the main heading of a web page, marked by the <h1> HTML tag. It typically appears at the top of the content and tells both users and search engines what the page is about.

Meta titles and meta descriptions are HTML elements that provide a summary of a web page’s content. They appear in search engine result pages (SERPs) and play a key role in SEO and click-through rates (CTRs).

H1 titles and meta titles:

• Keep these under 60 characters

• Include a target keyword naturally

• Make it compelling (use numbers, power words, etc.)

Meta description:

• Keep the meta description under 160 characters

• Summarize the page’s content concisely in the meta description

• Use a call-to-action (CTA) like "Learn more" or "Discover now"

• Use keywords naturally

Include the primary keyword in the following:

• H1 title and meta title

• First 100 words

• URL Slug

• H2s, H3s - optional; alternatively, you could add secondary or long-tail keywords here

• Avoid keyword stuffing; keep keyword insertions natural and user-friendly

Improve internal linking

Link to related content within your site to boost engagement and improve search engine indexing. Use descriptive anchor text instead of generic terms like “click here”.

Regularly update content

Refresh older posts with updated information and keywords. Remove broken links and outdated content.

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Language choices, style and terminology 

Alumnus - to refer to all graduates, regardless of gender

Among, not amongst

Ensuite, not en-suite or en suite

Initial payment, not deposit (only in relation to paying INTO fees, not deposits in general, as legally it's not a deposit) - applies to UK and Australia only

One-to-one or 1:1, not 1-1

While, not whilst

Wi-Fi, not wifi or WiFi