UCFB Etihad Campus student Rebecca Hawksworth has shown a keen desire to pack her CV full of great work placements since first joining the institution. Now, the BA (Hons) Multimedia Sports Journalism student can place the Manchester Evening News alongside the likes of the Huddersfield Town and Sensible Soccer…
Since starting my degree programme last year, print journalism was always something that I had wanted to gain work experience in and I was recently given the fantastic privilege of being able to spend a week at the Manchester Evening News (M.E.N.).
The M.E.N. is one of the biggest regional newspapers in the country and has a particularly extensive sports readership due to the popularity and success of both Manchester United and Manchester City; so I was delighted when the opportunity came about.
I was alerted to the opportunity by the UCFB marketing department after Alice McKeegan, Head of Football at the paper, met with them and said that she would be interested in taking some students on a work placement and that she was a keen advocate of helping women break into the football industry.
After sending off my CV to Alice she invited me in to work on the sports desk. While working at the M.E.N’s offices in Oldham, I was mostly tasked with writing several feature articles based on both Manchester clubs.
It was great for me to be given a free reign on these articles and brainstorm ideas to choose topical subjects that I wanted to write about. It was a pleasure to have the responsibility of managing my own work while on the placement as it allowed me to express my own writing abilities.
My week at the M.E.N. gave me a great insight into what is required of a print journalist and allowed me to compare this kind of journalism to other forms that I had previously experienced, such a news articles or social media content.
Print journalism was something which previously I had not gained any experience in and had not had much insight into so it was great to be able to have access to that form of journalism and further enhance my CV.
My placement has also allowed me to further expand my contacts list – something which is incredibly important when trying to break into the sports industry!
