Expanding Skills: Journalism
This week I wrote my first ever article for Source News. In the past I have done some small article writing, either for Media and English coursework and in the past for the old school newspaper. Writing for Source News was not in my comfort zone, however, as I really want to develop a wide range of media skills during my degree, I pushed myself with this article.
For the article I chose a topic that I know a lot about…food. Having studied home economics for my A-levels it was something I felt confident discussing. As the deadline was for the first of December I decided that my article should have a festive feel to it. Choosing the specific focus was the hardest part of the whole article, as I wanted it to be useful for other students. After much consideration I settled on how to make a Christmas dinner, student style.
This article required a lot of research, including doing price and weight comparisons of festive foods from multiple supermarkets. I also had to compare the difference between buying specialist Christmas versions of foods and finding ‘normal’ versions of foods. This was the longest part of the process, however this research made writing up the findings much easier. In the article I only discussed the cheapest option; an improvement might have been to show the price comparisons from the different supermarkets, to demonstrate how much a student could save from shopping elsewhere.
For my first article I decided to write in more of a blog style, this is because of the past couple of months I believe I have become more confident in this semi-formal style. I also thought that the blog style would be most suitable for the article as it is not discussing something serious, such as current events, university events nor an interview. Therefore, aiming it at students I thought they would relate most to a blog format.
In addition to how to make a student Christmas dinner, I also choose to share two of my favourite student friendly Christmas recipes: Cranberry Warmer and Pinwheel Mince Pies. As the student Christmas dinner focused on using frozen food that only had to be put in the oven, I also wanted to cater for students who enjoy cooking and making their own food and drink.
In the future I would perhaps like to write more serious articles, maybe focusing on events or interviews. This would stretch my ability further and would help me to start to understand that industry better. I hope that over time my confidence in writing will increase and my level of professionalism will also improve. For future articles I would like to take my own photographs to go alongside what I’ve written, as this would also let me practice a different set of skills and boost the visual appeal of the article.
By being a part of Source News I am developing a new skill, and although my articles are only on the Coventry University Student Union site, to me this is a huge achievement. I would like to think that once day I might be able to try working more closely with newspapers, as previously I have considered publishing as a career option, however, as I am still unsure what I would like to do in the future, I believe it is vitally important to try and expand my skills in as many ways as possible. This will also allow me to explore various aspects of the media industry to aid in my future decision of what career I would like to pursue.
Link to Christmas Recipes article: https://www.cusu.org/news/article/7513/Christmas-Recipes/
Link to Student Christmas Dinner: https://www.cusu.org/news/article/7513/Christmas-Dinner-Student-Style/