Diploma In Journalism

Course details

This lively, practical and hands-on course immerses students in the world of journalism, teaching them both the fundamental skills of the trade alongside the new tools of digital-age media.

Taught by a team of highly experienced professional journalists who bring current real-world experience to bear on every class, the programme focuses on developing journalistic instincts and abilities in newsroom-based practical sessions. The programme is divided into four modules: News Reporting, Digital Journalism, Features, Magazine & Lifestyle Journalism and Media Law.

This course provides students with a challenging, hands-on training in journalism for the digital age. It addresses such issues as how quality journalism can be maintained in the age of hyper-media coverage; how a commitment to the truth and the standards of journalism can be protected from the voracious demands of news on the internet; how in-depth, insightful and painstakingly researched investigations can survive in an era of 24/7 news coverage.

From the first class, there is an emphasis on the importance of writing clear, crisp, conscise copy. The programme aims to produce journalists who understand the needs of diverse media producers and consumers, the legal and ethical parameters of the profession and the opportunities offered by new media for freelance and staff journalists to build their own brand.

Course Outline

Module: News Reporting

• News sense: what makes stories newsworthy and how to develop your news instincts
• Newsgathering and sources: how and where journalists source information
• Building your contacts
• Language of news: angles, readerships, and the unique vocabulary of news reporting
• Structure and form of news stories
• Quotations, reported speech, press releases
• Objectivity, balance and accuracy
• Interviewing for news

Module: Digital Journalism

• Blogging: how blogs are changing the face of political, sports and entertainment journalism
• Social Networks: Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram – journalism’s new toolkit
• Robohacks: how journalists become multi-taskers, writing, blogging, podcasting, tweeting and filming
• The old and the new: in the brave new world of social networking, wikileaks and citizen journalism, we still need to get it right. Libel, source checks and fact checks in the digital age

Module: Lifestyle, Magazine and Freelance Journalism

• Feature formats and magazine methods: the most commonly used features in journalism and the tricks and techniques used in magazine packages
• Feature writing: structure, research and holding your readers
• Making it flow: how to bring facts, interviews, and context together to form compelling narratives
• Lifestyle journalism: writing for gendered magazines, popular culture, leisure and lifestyle
• Pitching your ideas: what do editors want and how do you persuade them that you have it?
• Survival of the freelance: how to earn a living and make the most of your work

Module: Media Law

• Freedom of expression
• Defamation
• Court reporting
• Privacy and the public interest
• Copyright & data protection
• Media regulation

Entry Requirements

• There are no formal entry requirements