First day of University (Southampton Solent)

Going to university is something that i have considered to be compulsory ever since i decided that journalism was the field that i wanted to break into. I know that this route isn't for everyone and that there are plenty of other ways to make a very successful career for yourself in the industry, but for me both the social and learning aspects of studying a degree combine into the perfect mix for an exciting three years as a student. 

When i decided that the course that i wanted to study was Magazine Journalism i had absolutely no idea just how many different universities offered the course, surely they're all the same though right? Wrong. After scrolling through numerous university websites and ordering enough prospectuses to fill the majority of my bedroom, it became apparent to me that this wasn't going to be an easy decision to make, especially as each course teaches and presents the course in a variety of ways. 

The best way of narrowing down the best university for you is to write a list of the things that you want to get out of the course. Do you want to be NCTJ accredited by the end of it (i'll explain what this is in another post) or do you want to further your study and take on a course which will allow you to mix journalism with another subject such as business or public relations. All these are answers that can be provided to you by each individual university, and yes this can be time consuming- but you are going to be in around £40k of debt by the end of the three years, so it's definitely worth taking the time to research your options.

After deliberating and nearly losing my mind over the choices i had i came across the Southampton Solent University webpage and instantly knew that this was the course i was going to study. The course itself combines vocational training with academic study and aims to teach you in a way that will make you an adaptable and dynamic magazine journalist. It also enables you to gain essential skills in reporting, feature-writing, sub-editing, interviewing, research, design and publishing business skills. You are then given the option to specialise in areas such as music journalism or fashion, travel writing, politics or photojournalism when you progress into year three.

So, if you're wondering what type of career you can gain from this course there is a whole list on the Solent Magazine Journalism page, here are just a few;

- Feature writing

- Online editing

- Magazine page design

- Sub-editing

- Retail industries

Hopefully this post will have cleared up a few points and maybe even helped you to decide whether or not studying Journalism is for you! This is going to be an on-going topic throughout this blog, so if you're interested then keep popping back for updates!