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My daughter has decided she wants a career in media. She will hopefully be heading off to Uni in 2019.
She appears to have her heart set on that London - Queen Mary University to study English and film to be exact. The same degree could be pursued locally for less than half the cost in tuition fees and a lot lower living costs.
I appreciate she may have to relocate on graduation but at least she would be earning herself and perhaps have a lot less student loan debt shackling her.
Is there any advantage to going to any particular uni to prepare for a career in media? I have read a lot of the media industry is moving out of London to lower overheads.
What's the alternative location?
"Is there any advantage to going to any particular uni to prepare for a career in media?"
Yes, massively, like any Uni degree. The course content, its delivery and your likelihood of getting a job afterwards is highly determined by the University you choose. Placements or year in industry is a good idea. Also many (better opportunity) Uni's will have a student run newspaper or radio or something to get involved with. Unfortunately media is one of the most competitive job markets where many people will work for free (interns) to get experience. What would be a complete waste of money and opportunity would be to go to your 'local' Uni just to save living costs but have a crap course and no job opportunities at the end of it.
As much as I hate league tables, you need some idea of the best Uni's for media and then go to as many open days as you can to get a feel for the place and the course. There are statistics available for e.g. number of students employed or in further study after 6 months. The best places will have good numbers plastered all over their web pages! Does Queen Mary have a high employability?
We live in NI. Alternative location is here. Lots going on in media (Game of Thrones principally). Annual tuition fees here are around £4,500.
Konagirl, I've had a look at the prospectus and website for Queen Mary. While they do publish student employment stats, it doen't specify that employment is in a relevant field.
Heading off to the open day in October.
What sort of 'media'?
I work in TV at the moment, I got a bit lucky and ended up here by accident but potentially parachuted straight into a decent wage of the next job comes in. I work on the technical side of production though, not the arty side.
I'd say half the people I work with did electronic engineering and the other half went to Beaconsfield.
Has she tried getting work as a runner? It will at least be an eye opener to the day to day drudgery of making TV, and the good ones get asked back and promoted pretty quickly.
If you have friends/relatives in Surrey I know of a documentary starting filming early next year I could ask if they have any space for a work experience student.
The uni itself is fairly important - as important is the people she will meet along the way though, as in my experience in media, it's often who you know, not what you know.
WRT student debt, and without wanting to diminish it's importance, please fully read up on how it works, how it's repaid, the reduction in take home from salaries etc. It's a political hot potato, but one that ime is often miss reported or mis understood, and shouldn't really be a massive barrier to entry, so long as it's fully researched from the beginning.
And yes, I have student debt.