BA (Honours) Journalism
Part-time
Location • City Campus
Related subjects • Media, PR and journalism
By adding to My Courses you can compare courses and create a personalised prospectus.
Read about our journalism students who volunteered to help run BBC Radio 5 lives' three-day Octoberfest festival in Sheffield's city centre.
Sheffield Hallam journalism students join the Commonwealth Games' press operations team as volunteers. Find out more.
Sheffield Hallam students were chosen as the only UK university to provide International Volunteers of Olympic News Service for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. Find out more.
View a 360 degree tour of the Cantor lecture theatre.
Read about our media PR and journalism teaching team
Our Digital Design Centre can print medium to large format high quality outputs on a range of different media. The laboratories have software supporting 2D and 3D engineering and creative design applications. Find out more.
We have a Creative Media Centre which contains the latest video, photographic and media equipment and resources for you to use. Find out more.
One of the most valuable resources available for you to access is our highly experienced technical support team. Find out how they can help support your development.
We work closely with the National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ) to ensure a strong focus on the core skills necessary for a career in the media.
The course covers journalism practice and theory. Course content draws on current developments in journalism and the media to extend your practical skills as well as awareness of the debates and issues in the industry.
You develop the basic skills of good journalism – an ability to spot a good story and to write an accurate and balanced report. At the same time, you develop the practical, professional and other skills necessary to sit the NCTJ diploma examinations in newspaper journalism, public affairs, law and shorthand.
You study • print • radio and television broadcasting • online journalism. You also deepen your understanding of the professional, economic, cultural and ethical role of journalism in modern society.
You learn how to gather, organise, write and present information to professional standards. We also introduce you to some of the specialist expertise needed by journalists working in areas such as • sport • travel writing • consumer journalism • weblogging.
We encourage you to take a critical approach to the issues that shape and relate to present day journalism.
As well as developing a questioning and ethical approach to your work you gain practical, intellectual and social skills, which make you readily employable in a range of other professions.
NCTJ pathway
You can choose to study as an independent candidate (outside of your course) for the preliminary examinations of the NCTJ. The course has a strong focus on teaching and developing the core personal, practical and professional skills necessary for a career in the media.
There is also a full-time version of this course.
You develop the core skills of good journalism – the ability to spot a good story and to write an accurate and balanced report.
Find out more about BA (Honours) Journalism
Related courses
Part-time – typically six years
Complete the application form available at www.shu.ac.uk/study/form
2013/14 academic year
Typically £4,500 a year
The course fee may be subject to annual inflationary increase. For further information on fees and funding see www.shu.ac.uk/funding
• essays • reports • electronic assessment • oral presentations • projects • portfolio work
You develop skills in print, broadcast or electronic publishing.
Sheffield Hallam students taken on by BBC Radio 5
A group of media and journalism students from Sheffield Hallam were taken on by BBC Radio 5 Live to help run the station's 'Octoberfest' festival.
The station was based in Sheffield between 11–13 October for its annual Octoberfest event – a free three-day festival, featuring an exciting programme of live broadcasts and events across the city.
20 Sheffield Hallam students volunteered at the event. They visited the new BBC MediaCity site in Salford with their radio lecturer and 5 Live journalist Philo Holland for a development day ahead of the festival. They also met senior staff from the station, including network manager Paul Blakeley.
Sheffield Hallam journalism lecturer Philo Holland said: "This will be a fantastic experience for our budding broadcasters – to take part in an exciting live radio festival. Sheffield Hallam has a great relationship with the BBC, and our graduates are well-placed to take advantage of the big opportunities on offer at MediaCity.”
Programmes were broadcast live from the Crucible and Lyceum theatres. Some of 5 Live’s biggest names, including Nicky Campbell, Richard Bacon, Simon Mayo and Mark Kermode, were on hand to lead discussions and get visitors involved.
Sheffield Hallam students assisted the production team during live audience debates and the interactive events in the 5 Live Igloo, where visitors could try their hand at being a radio presenter, football commentator or TV weather presenter.
Listen to the students' interviews from the festival here.
Journalism students to be at heart of India Commonwealth Games
A group of journalism students from Sheffield Hallam University are jetting off to India for a unique assignment, covering the Commonwealth Games in Delhi. The 30 students will be at the heart of the sporting action as they join the Games' press operations team as volunteers.
Sheffield Hallam is the only university in the world to have this agreement with the Games and the students were selected following a competitive process to secure their place. They will get the chance to work in the Games' state-of-the-art press and broadcasting centre, supplying information to the more than 5,000 media representatives attending the Games. They will work to keep the media up-to date with the latest news from the Games by supplying stories for its news service.
Daniel Young, 21 and from Sheffield, is one of the students going. He has wasted no time in making the most of his opportunity, securing a chance to guest edit the education supplement of The Times of India.
He said: "This is the opportunity of a lifetime and this amazing work experience will really help me to stand out when I look for my first job. I am looking forward to experiencing a new culture and to working with world class journalists, broadcasters and, of course, athletes, during my time in India.
"Very few people get the chance to be at the heart of a global sporting competition and I am fascinated to learn more about how an event of this size and complexity is managed and delivered."
Jessica Bridge, 21, from Naseby in Northamptonshire is also hoping the experience will stand her in good stead when she comes to look for jobs after graduation. She said: "I am delighted to have been selected to work at the Games. I just can't wait to get out there, the first hand experience of interviewing athletes will be incredible.
"Not many people can say they have worked at a major sporting event before they have graduated. It is a unique opportunity and I hope it is something that stands out on my CV for years to come."
Professor Philip Jones, Vice Chancellor at Sheffield Hallam, said: "This is a wonderful opportunity for our students and we would like to thank the Delhi Organising Committee for giving us this exclusive opportunity.
"Not only will the students benefit from working on an internationally prestigious project, they will also have the opportunity to work in an international setting, which will help them to prepare for working in a global environment when they graduate."
Sheffield Hallam was chosen as the only UK University to provide International Volunteers of Olympic News Service for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. The University was selected due to our strong reputation for journalism courses at Masters level. The University partnered with Renmin University of China in Beijing.
The Beijing Organizing Committee for the Games (BOCOG) of the XXIX Olympiad organised several partnerships between Chinese and overseas universities to ensure their news services had a strong supply of international news service volunteers, but also to present a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for students around the world to participate in the reporting at the Games.
A unique link between the Beijing Olympic press office and Sheffield Hallam gave 24 of our students the chance to experience the Olympic Games. A group from our undergraduate and postgraduate media and journalism courses were the only European students selected to work in China during the games. They worked alongside professional journalists, interviewing athletes and writing new pieces for the press office which acted as a newswire service for national and international media.
Phil Andrews, senior lecturer in sports journalism said, 'Our journalism courses are among the most popular in Britain, and we attract a very high calibre of students - a reputation which is reflected in the fact that our students were invited to take part in the Beijing Olympics'.
Cantor Lecture Theatre
The Cantor lecture theatre opened in 2008 in the state-of-the-art Cantor Building.
Russell Jackson
Course leader for the undergraduate PR courses
Russell, a sociologist, is a senior lecturer in communication studies and public relations and currently course leader for the undergraduate public relations courses.
He gained an MA in Cultural Studies from the University of Leeds in 1997. His Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded doctoral thesis was a Foucauldian analysis of the construction of responsibility for employee health.
He has presented numerous conference papers and during 2003 was a guest lecturer at the University of Toronto. His main teaching and research interests are in attempting to utilise poststructuralist insights from within a broadly Marxist framework in the areas of health, drugs, governmentality, moral panics, public relations, surveillance and neoliberalism.
Carmel O’Toole
Senior lecturer
Carmel O’Toole is a senior lecturer in public relations at Sheffield Hallam University and works with both undergraduate and postgraduate students.
She is a journalist and Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) award-winning practitioner with over 20 years experience in the industry. Carmel is a former local government head of communications and communications manager for Channel 4.
Now also a freelance PR consultant, Carmel works with public and private sector organisations on strategic communications, reputation risk and crisis PR planning and management, media and plain English training, web content development and publications production. Carmel also has extensive experience in events management. Current and recent clients include Serco, Channel 4, Beam, The Mersey Forest plus regional local authorities and housing associations.
An associate consultant with two regional PR agencies, Carmel became an associate lecturer at Sheffield Hallam in 2008. She was appointed to her current post in early 2010, is a member of the National Union of Journalists and the Chartered institute of Public Relations.
Adrian Roxan
Senior lecturer
Adrian is a senior lecturer in public relations teaching at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels.
He is a trained journalist who switched to public relations after spells working in newspapers, magazines and radio. He has worked in the public relations field for 25 years including running a busy London local government press office, working in national health education and three years running the press office at the British Medical Association.
He ran a leading public sector PR consultancy for eight years specialising in issues management with clients as diverse as the Audit Commission, the NHS Cancer Screening Programmes, ACAS, the Healthcare Commission and the Financial Services Authority.
Adrian moved into teaching in 2007 before joining Sheffield Hallam University as a permanent member of staff at the beginning of 2010. He is a member of the National Union of Journalists and the Chartered Institute of Public Relations.
Sue Featherstone
Senior lecturer
Sue is a journalist with over 20 years experience in regional newspapers and corporate public relations. As a journalist, she has covered a broad range of writing specialisms and this is reflected in her teaching interests, which include broadsheet and magazine feature writing, profiles, personal columns, reviews and opinion pieces.
In 2008 she was journalism lead on a sports initiative which saw two dozen Sheffield Hallam students work as volunteers in the Media Centre at the Beijing Olympics. Amongst other things, they were involved in collecting ‘flash’ quotes from competitors which were fed into a central database for use by sports journalists from all over the world. She has also co-ordinated a similar initiative for the 2010 Commonwealth Games in New Delhi.
She is co-author of Feature Writing: A Practical Introduction, published by Sage in Spring 2006, and Newspaper Journalism: A Practical Introduction, which was also published by Sage in Spring 2005. In addition, she is a marker and assessor for the National Council for the Training of Journalists. She is currently working on her first novel.
Andrew Pollard
Senior lecturer
After graduating with a first class art history degree and achieving a distinction in my masters on cultural policy, I have taught for the past nine years on BA Arts Management and am course leader for MA Cultural Policy and Management at Sheffield Hallam University.
I have been a freelance curator for many years, with successful exhibitions in Yorkshire and Cornwall. I now manage the Clare White Gallery in Barnsley, specialising in Cornish art. I also worked with several South Yorkshire schools and arts practitioners for the Arts Council-funded Creative Partnerships programme for 18 months.
I have co-authored articles and presented at conferences nationally on the topic of home display practices and the use of museum collections among Pakistani communities in South Yorkshire. As part of this research, I curated the successful 'Ferham Families' exhibition at Rotherham Arts Centre in 2007.
Julie Gillin
Senior lecturer
Julie is an experienced journalist and public relations (PR) consultant. She worked as a reporter, feature writer and deputy news editor on The Sheffield Star, Sheffield Telegraph and Derbyshire Times newspapers. She has particular interest in health journalism and feature writing.
As a PR consultant, Julie spent two years with media consultancy HR Media working with clients including Sheffield Children’s Hospital, Sheffield United FC, Westfield Health, Community Health Sheffield and Sheffield Health Authority. She was press officer for the Weston Park Hospital Cancer Appeal charity in Sheffield for two years.
As a freelance PR consultant she specialised in the health and charity sector. Her work included providing media training for charities and small businesses.
Julie has taught journalism and public relations at Sheffield Hallam for eight years and is the course leader for MA Public Relations. She is a member of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations.
Julie is currently studying for an MSC in Technology Enhanced Learning, Innovation and Change.
Noel Williams
Professor of communication
Noel joined Sheffield Hallam in 1979. He’s now professor of communication, with former responsibilities including head of art, design, communication and media and acting head of postgraduate research in the Cultural, Communication and Computing Research Institute (C3RI). His main research interests are in writing, especially creative writing, in digital communications and writing technologies, and in e-learning, both at policy and practical levels.
In 2003 he was seconded to the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) to manage the evaluation of Curriculum OnLine. In 2005 the Institute of Scientific and Technical Communicators awarded him the Horace Hockley Award for his contribution to the technical publications industry.
He has acted as communications consultant or researcher for the Arthritis and Rheumatism Council, AT&T, British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (BECTA), the British Academy, british Standards Institution (BSI), BYG Systems, the Crown prosecution Service (CPS), the DfES, JISC, General Domestic Appliances, IBM (UK), Hepworth Heating, Learning and Teaching Support Network - Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences (LTSN-GEES), National Council for Vocational Qualifications (NCVQ), Peak Park Planning Authority, Scottish Vocational Educational Council (SCOTVEC), Sheffield City Council, Skillset and local Training and Enterprise Councils (TECs).
Current research interests are teaching writing and creativity, computer game design, interactive texts and e-learning. His most recent book is 'How to Get a 2.1 in Media, Communication and Cultural Studies' (Sage). As a poet, he is resident artist at Bank Street Arts Centre, has published over a hundred poems and won a dozen prizes, and he’s currently working with Sheffield’s Art in the Park on projects to bring poetry to local communities.
Carolyn Waudby
Senior lecturer
Carolyn is a senior lecturer and also works as a freelance writer, specialising in travel features for newspapers and magazines.
Between 2003 and 2005 she carried out press work for a government minister. Before turning freelance in 2000 she worked in regional newspapers for 15 years. Her last position was as a feature writer and columnist with The Star, Sheffield. Prior to that she specialised in consumer journalism.
Whilst working for the Peterborough Evening Telegraph she received a Newspaper Society award for coverage of a flood disaster in Pakistan. She has written several websites, including an internet guide to Sheffield, and a website for children on the history of the fairground for the University of Sheffield.
Carolyn worked with young people as part of the Government’s Gifted and Talented programme, and was a journalistic advisor for the journalism charity Children’s Express in Sheffield.
She is also a published poet. In 2000 she received an Arts Council grant to produce a pamphlet of poetry based on works of art. The same year a poem on wind turbines was used as the basis of a short film for the big screen. She won third prize in the Ilkley Literature Festival Poetry Competition 2007 and was a winner in the Mslexia Poetry Competition 2009. Also in 2009 she staged a collaborative exhibition of her poems on Cuba with photographs for the Off The Shelf literature festival.
Rinella Cere
Senior lecturer
I am a senior lecturer in media and cultural studies. I am the course leader of the MA Communication and Media and I teach on the MA and BA (Hons) Media and Journalism courses.
My teaching and research is in • post-colonial media cultures • globalisation and the media • international museums of cinema • Italian media culture.
I am co-editor of Postcolonial Media Culture in Britain (Palgrave 2011) and author of The Love of Cinema: an international study of museums of cinema and their audience (Routledge, forthcoming publication 2011).
Other recent published work has covered Italian media culture and globalisation (Globalization vs. Localization: anti-immigrant and hate discourses in Italian media in Beyond Monopoly: Contemporary Italian Media and Globalization, Ardizzoni, M. and Ferrari, C. eds., Lexington Books, 2010).
An important strand of my research has been in the representations of gender in an Italian cultural and media context, this has generated two publications: The Body of the Woman Hostage, Spectacular bodies and Berlusconi’s media in War Body on Screen, Randall, K. and Redmond S. eds., (Continuum, 2008) and Forever Girls: Female Ultras and Football Support in Italy in Sport and its Female Fans, K. Toffoletti & P. Mewett (eds), Routledge, forthcoming 2011).
Clare Jenkins
Senior lecturer
Clare is a freelance journalist and national radio broadcaster. As a partner in Pennine Productions, she has produced features, documentaries and short stories for Radio 4, as well as contributing to magazine programmes such as Woman’s Hour.
As a print journalist, she has written for various newspapers and magazines. She’s also edited and written a number of books based on personal testimony, among which are Relative Grief – about people’s experience of bereavement – and A Passion for Priests, about women’s relationships with Roman Catholic priests.
A major interest is oral history - she is a visiting research fellow at the Centre for Oral History Research in Huddersfield, where she co-ordinated a project about the Remembrance Day two-minute silence. Her programme on the same subject was broadcast on Radio 4 on Remembrance Sunday 2009. She also runs an oral history training company, Vox Pops.
Clare is a regular visitor to India, reporting on such varied subjects as the status of widows and lesbians, the Anglo-Indian community, and the cultural significance of the bindi, the red dot on the forehead of married women.
David Clarke
Senior lecturer
David is a senior lecturer and course leader in journalism teaching media law and investigation skills. Before joining Sheffield Hallam he worked as a news reporter for The Sheffield Star and the Yorkshire Post and spent four years working as a press officer in local government.
David's research interests include • investigative journalism • official secrets • censorship • freedom of information. He has a PhD in Folklore which was completed at the National Centre for English Cultural Tradition at the University of Sheffield in 1999. David's interest in folklore, contemporary legends and the supernatural goes back to his childhood. He has authored and co-authored 12 books and numerous journal, magazine and newspaper articles on aspects of supernatural belief and tradition. David writes a monthly column for the Fortean Times and sits on the editorial board of The Skeptic.
Since 2008 he has been working with The National Archives (TNA) as their consultant for the ongoing release of the UFO files created by Britain's Ministry of Defence. David's book The UFO Files was published by TNA in September 2009.
Image courtesy of The Sheffield Star.
David Farbey
Associate lecturer
David joined the teaching team of the MA Professional Communication after completing his MA in Technical Communication in 2004.
He is module leader for the software documentation module, and co-teaches on the information design and collaborative work modules. He has taught courses on professional writing at Coventry University, and is also a tutor for the Institute of Scientific and Technical Communicators (ISTC)'s Open Learning course in technical communication.
David has been active in the technical communications field since 1994, and he is a Fellow of the Institute of Scientific and Technical Communicators and a Member of the British Computer Society. He has presented at professional technical communications conferences in the UK, Europe, and the USA.
During his wide ranging technical communications career, David has worked both as an independent consultant and contractor and as a staff member and manager. He has written user guides, self-study tutorials, online help systems, reference manuals, policy and procedure guides, and many other types of business documents.
His work covers a wide range of business activities including infrastructure projects, e-learning systems, financial applications, image recognition and processing, enterprise resource planning, and business processes and procedures, as well as copywriting and marketing writing projects. He has worked in a variety of software development environments, and has designed and managed research projects in both the academic and the public sector fields.
Philo Holland
Senior lecturer
He's worked at BBC Radio 5 Live for over ten years, as a reporter, producer, presenter and editor. He spent four years working with Adrian Chiles on his Sony award-winning Saturday sports talk show.
As both a news and sports reporter he’s covered stories across the world, from general elections to World Cups, appearing on Radio 4’s Today programme, 5 Live Breakfast and BBC World Service. Philo's worked with some of the nation’s most respected broadcasters, including Eamonn Holmes, Richard Bacon and Victoria Derbyshire and now divides his time between Sheffield Hallam University and editing the Stephen Nolan show.
Before becoming a journalist he was a linguist, graduating from Durham University with a joint honours degree in Russian and French.
Philo teaches on the BA (Hons) Journalism, BA (Hons) Media and MA International Broadcast Journalism courses.
Dr Geff Green
Senior lecturer
Before joining the communication team at Sheffield Hallam University in 1997, Geff worked as a musician, taught English in Indonesia for two years and later designed, programmed and maintained professional multimedia applications, eventually joining Epic Media Group PLC in Brighton.
Since joining Sheffield Hallam University, he has taught professional and technical communication mainly at masters level and supervised four PhDs ranging from art and design to technical communication. He has been involved with teaching multimedia and communication design to undergraduate students and teaches modules specialising in research methods, online design, online journalism and visual communication. He also currently undertakes knowledge transfer and international business development work for the university.
His research work has focused mainly on South East Asian cultural history and identity with specific focus on film and visual culture, but more recently this interest has expanded to include media anthropology. He retains an interest in visual arts and music and continues work on photographic and digital montage projects in his spare time.
Phil Andrews
Senior lecturer
I am a senior lecturer in journalism at Sheffield Hallam University and I teach on the sports journalism and international broadcast journalism postgraduate courses.
My background is in sports and television journalism, and I am the author of the standard text on sports journalism, used in universities throughout the world - Sport Journalism: A practical Introduction, published by Sage, London.
I have worked for many years as a sports journalist at The Independent and The Independent on Sunday, national newspapers in the UK.
I am also a TV journalist for ITV, British Independent broadcaster, and have worked as a radio journalist for the BBC.
I won several awards as a sportswriter, including awards from the Sports Writers' association, UK Press Gazette, and was Yorkshire Sports Writer of the Year three times.
I am a former political editor and was head of public relations for Sheffield City Council, one of Britain's largest local authorities, for seven years. I have written two novels, published in London by Hodder and Stoughton.
I teach on the sports journalism and sport and the media modules, and also teach public affairs for journalists.
Profiles
Russell Jackson
Course leader for the undergraduate PR courses
Carmel O’Toole
Senior lecturer
Adrian Roxan
Senior lecturer
Sue Featherstone
Senior lecturer
Andrew Pollard
Senior lecturer
Julie Gillin
Senior lecturer
Noel Williams
Professor of communication
Carolyn Waudby
Senior lecturer
Rinella Cere
Senior lecturer
Clare Jenkins
Senior lecturer
David Clarke
Senior lecturer
David Farbey
Associate lecturer
Philo Holland
Senior lecturer
Dr Geff Green
Senior lecturer
Phil Andrews
Senior lecturer
The Digital Design Centre
The Digital Design Centre comprises a suite of 6 IT laboratories (4 PC and 2 MAC) together with the Print Output room, an area for printing medium to large format high quality output on a range of different media. The laboratories have a wide range of software supporting 2D and 3D engineering and creative design applications.
The Digital Design Centre runs a high quality computer printing facility and has the ability to print sizes between A4 and A0 and wide format banners. A3, A2, A1, A0 and Banner photo quality printing is available on a range of papers, as well as AutoCAD type plans ( B & W ) on standard paper.
Creative Media Centre
The Creative Media Centre comprises the following areas.
Creative media support desk
The Creative Media Support Desk coordinates the booking, issues and returns of film, video, photographic and media equipment. Technical staff provide specialist support to the media and studio facilities associated with the Creative Media Centre. Training workshops in the use of specialist equipment such as HDV Cameras, Pro SLRs, Studio lights etc. are held at regular intervals.
Photographic darkrooms and studios
Our darkrooms can be used to manually process
photographs. Colour and black and white processing 
machines are also available. Each studio comprises of a backdrop roll, flash lighting grid, filters, Apple macpro and everything you’d expect to find in a professional student environment. We have a dedicated digital darkroom alongside the studios that cater for all kinds of digital photography and print editing.
Performance studio with sound editing and set building facilities in the Workstation
The off-site Workstation performance studio is used for a variety of activities including production shoots, set building and teaching.
TV and radio studio facilities 
We have a TV studio comprising a two camera setup with autocue and a separate control room. The control room houses the vision mixer, video and sound facilities. TV Studio output can be broadcast to both of the newsrooms. The radio studio consists of a Myraid Radio playout and automation system along with an industry standard mixing desk and various outboard equipment. Radio studio output can also be broadcast to both newsrooms.
Apple and PC IT labs, video/sound edit suites and Animation and Protools studios
Apple Macintosh software includes Final Cut Pro, Avid, Adobe Premier, I-Movie, Video Editing DVD Studio Pro, IDVD, Toast DVD Authoring Adobe Photoshop Image Manipulation Logic Studio Pro, Pro-Tools, Soundtrack Pro Sound/Music Creation I-Stop Motion, Stop Motion Pro Stop Frame Animation Adobe Production Premium Collection of Production Software.
PC software includes Adobe Production Premium video editing autocue software, TV studio autocue software, Myriad radio studio software, radio broadcast software.
Technical support team
While you will find excellent facilities throughout, the most valuable resource you will have at your disposal is access to our extremely dedicated, highly experienced technical staff.
All the staff are there to support you during your time in the workshops. The technical team with its professionally qualified staff and practicing professionals, has a wealth of knowledge and expertise across all areas of our provision and comprises engineers, designers, silversmiths and jewellers, fine artists, media arts specialists and IT experts.
The team are committed to using their diverse range of skills and knowledge to support practical aspects of your
course work, whether solving a simple software problem, producing a complex engineering project or creating design work for an international exhibition. There are currently 50 technical staff directly supporting the Technical Resource Centres and the research institutes of the faculty.
