Fledgling UEA journalism course wins prestigious national award
By: Communications
(Written by Anna Johnson)
The UEA Broadcast Journalism course has won a prestigious national award for ‘Best Online News Site’ at the BJTC awards at Sky TV in London.
The UEA Journalism website displays the best coursework from the UEA journalism degrees and is updated weekly by third year students, who supervise and approve the work by other year groups.
Judges said the website has “punchy writing, with some eye-catching pictures and impressive headlines”, which reflects the effort of all the students who have worked to create, edit and post news stories on the site. John Pullman of Thomson Reuters said there was some “really great work” from the student journalists.
Clare Precey, Course Director for UEA Journalism, said: “This is the first time we've been shortlisted for an award, and we've won it. It shows how hard the student journalists have worked creating multimedia content for the website. It is wonderful to have been recognised at a national level and impressed the senior editors across the journalism industry.”
The Broadcast Journalism Training Council (BJTC) recognises accredited courses each year in different categories such as Best TV News Report, Best Podcast and Best TV Sports Journalism.
This was UEA's first attendance at the awards, as the Broadcast Journalism BA has only been running for four years. Given this, it's all the more impressive that UEA was recognised alongside more established journalism courses, such as those at City, University of London and University of Sheffield.
The UEA Journalism website is managed by third year journalism students, who every few weeks take over as editor to monitor the stories written by first and second year students – an opportunity to create a professional environment and ensure students are prepared for the workplace.
Image L-R: Aimee Dexter, Cameron Noble, Anna Johnson
The event itself was also a great networking opportunity for course reps Aimee Dexter, Cameron Noble and Anna Johnson. They sought advice from Richard Frediani, editor of BBC Breakfast who told them to “take an interest in the job and they'll take an interest in you”, advising students that when they go for an interview to research the company in detail. They also met ITV journalist Sangita Lal and Sky News presenter Kamali Melbourne.
This BJTC award for UEA Journalism provides an inspiration to other students on the course, who will be aiming to win Best Newsday and other prizes at next year’s event.
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