Student views

Why Teesside?

Teesside was the first university I visited on an open day and within the first hour I knew it was the university for me. I’m not sure what it was exactly but something about the campus just felt right. The thing that attracted me the most though was the BA (Hons) Film and Television Production degree, which I studied at undergraduate level. The facilities were amazing, and the lecturers were real experts who still worked in industry so knew exactly what to include in the course.

When it came to my postgraduate course, it made sense to stay at Teesside – a University I had grown to love – to study a course where, again, there were fantastic industry links and knowledge from the lecturers. I picked up a lot of technical skills on both my undergraduate and postgraduate courses, but I think the most valuable things I learnt were soft skills, like public speaking, leading a team and time management. I can confidently say that the experience of going to university has been invaluable to my career from both a personal growth perspective and for developing industry links.

What is the best thing about your course?

My lecturers were fantastic and really pushed me to be the best I possibly could be. It felt as though they genuinely cared about my future and were very supportive in helping me get to where I wanted to be. I was a completely different person leaving University to when I joined and that is largely down to my lecturers seeing my potential and helping me realise it. The industry links at Teesside are so valuable in securing your first job out of university – which can be a scary prospect – but if you ask for it the help is there and always willingly given.

What is your current role and what are your ambitions for the future?

I work at DTW Advertising & Marketing as a Strategist, Film & Digital Engagement. My day-to-day role involves project management and strategic thinking, so it’s crucial to be able to organise myself and the project and know how to manage the team I’m working with. Public Relations is a fast paced industry and the technical skills you learn today may not still be relevant in five years-time, but I can confidently say that the experience of going to university has been invaluable to my career from both a personal growth perspective and for developing industry links.

I recently won the CIPR North East PRide Awards Young Communicator of the Year 2018 award and currently sit on the CIPR North East committee. Having worked across many areas of the business I’ve developed a wide skillset and regularly work on regional and national integrated campaigns involving film and animation production, social media, design, PR and marketing. In the future I aim to secure a role as a director within a communications agency, leading on large integrated campaigns which make a real difference to people’s lives and have an impact on society.