From supervising junior reporters as their news editor, to training tomorrow’s journalists as their course leader, teaching is a massive part of what I do and how I work.
I joined the journalism and media production teaching team at York St John in April 2019, from teaching journalism at Staffordshire University. I’m now Associate Head for Production in the School of Art at YSJU, leading our teaching teams across media and music production as well as journalism, and continuing to teach both practice and theory.
In 11 years at Staffs uni, I created and led new modules in entrepreneurial journalism, future journalism, web-based journalism (distance learning), games journalism, blogging and vlogging. As well as co-teaching on practical and theoretical journalism modules, news days, and in photojournalism. That multimedia approach to journalism teaching has continued in my move to York SJ, where I’m also delivering modules in magazine design, online production and multimedia news days.
I set up Square Peg Gamers as a live outlet for my students’ game journalism, and use my research and my own online work to underpin my teaching. One of my sites (Wreck of the Week) started as way to experiment with SEO ahead of being able to teach it. That site has now had over five million views.
I also work with small businesses on developing their online branding, SEO and PR – running short courses, delivering talks, and on-going consultancy work.