Global Journalism and Public Relations MA

at Coventry University

Why you should study this course
 

• You will be taught and mentored very well by a highly experienced teaching team, whose former roles include: contributing in Al Jazeera’s global media analysis show ‘The Listening Post’; managing communications and PR in Oxford; editing commercial magazine. Staff practice and research cover new approaches to digital distribution, the web, photography and videography as well as issues in global media and communication plus digital and social media trends. Example engagements include staff secondment to the University of Cambridge on Politics and Interactive Media in Africa project – researching how radio and TV presenters and journalists give the public a voice via interactive broadcasting (teaching staff are subject to change).
   

• We have links with journalism-media industry, including BBC, in the UK and elsewhere including USA, so we host high-profile guest speakers (subject to availability), who in the past have included a BBC Director-General, Channel 4 founder, a highly respected Channel 4 News anchor and a famous BBC Newsnight presenter.
   

• We help you to acquire the essential knowledge and practical skills needed for a successful career in global journalism or public relations as we get you used to working with multiple forms of media – generating traditional print, audio and video content, all the while embracing new technologies and creating parallel digital content, including social media, blogs and web-based content.
   

• You get opportunities to work individually and as part of a team on live projects2 such as a magazine, a global collaborative newscast and student union publications-broadcasts, among others.
   

• Facilities include newsrooms equipped with industry-standard hardware and software, a modern TV studio, radio studios and Media Loan Shop for professional equipment
   

What you'll study
 

If you’re interested in a career in media industry worldwide, our course is a comprehensive interdisciplinary introduction as well as an advancement of global journalism and public relations, which is underpinned by hands-on professional practice from the outset.
 

In the final stage of your course, there is an opportunity to explore issues in global journalism that interest you further through an extensive individual research project, with support and guidance from specialist tutors. Past students have considered anything from the use of diasporic media by British Bangladeshis in Birmingham to the coverage of Africa in Chinese media or fake news images in Digital Age.

Modules
 

• Context : Global Politics and Relations - 20 credits
   

  This module examines global communication(s) and media structures and practices related to them, especially in journalism and public relations. We analyse the changing political, economic, socio-cultural and technological systems, including media-communication systems, and their impacts on content and audiences in a globalised world.
   

• Public Relations - 10 credits
   

  This module covers the principles and practice of public relations (PR). It will provide you with the skills to construct, execute and apply public relations strategies to meet the objectives of an organisation. Acting as consultants on a real-world brief, you will learn how to help clients or employers build and maintain their profiles and reputations. You will be introduced to the code of ethics for public relations and critically engage with debates around ethics and law as it is applied to PR.
   

• Journalism Practice, Law and Ethics - 30 credits
   

  This module focuses on the fundamentals of journalistic practice. It concentrates on the practical, creative and technical skills associated with these professional practices. Topics addressed include: ideas, markets and sources; interviewing; notetaking and record keeping; news and feature writing; industry history and structure; conventions and techniques of specialist forms and genres. Students acquire practical skills through the production of journalistic pieces, with the support of the module team.
   

  Advanced Journalism: Digital, Social, Mobile - 20 credits
   

• This module focuses on advancing key skills that are employed by journalists in all platforms for various target audiences. The module takes students through the research process, working to a deadline and finally delivering the required product to a professional standard. Students work as a team to produce and resource a group project to deadline, under the direction of module staff. This prepares students for the impact that convergence has had on newsrooms. Students are specifically trained on how to produce a single story/topic for two or more key platforms for specific target audiences. The key themes include the importance of a more advanced understanding of the need to tailor the product to a specific target audience, including specialist outlets: developing the story, analysing source material, applying conventions and understanding techniques of production. Students are asked to engage with the ethical debates about journalistic practice in digital contexts and apply their understanding of ethics to their practice. There is strong emphasis on practical and technical skills required.
   

• Specialist Professional Practice in Journalism and PR - 30 credits
   

  This module provides you with the opportunity to acquire and develop specialist knowledge and skills necessary in a chosen area. It builds on practical journalism skills and techniques modules and other modules and it will allow you to expand the depth of your content creation and also devise ways of routinely doing so in your future practice. You will work under the supervision of a mentoring team on live specialist journalism projects either with a host organisation or at the university.
   

• Specialist Research and Analysis - 10 credits
   

  This module introduces a range of research tools and associated methods needed to undertake independent research on identified themes and issues in specialist journalism and public relations – relating to texts, audiences and industry. It provides grounding in a range of analytical techniques and ways of interpreting materials, and examines how these can be used to explore contemporary themes and issues which concern journalists, and journalism, as well as public relations in the UK and around the world. Concentrating mainly on textual analysis, the module helps to prepare students for research-led inquiry relating to journalism and public relations, including their major research project and investigative journalism.
   

• Major Project - 50 credits
   

  The Major Project provides students with an opportunity to create an original and intellectually critical extended piece of writing and/or practical project portfolio. With an allocated specialist tutor students create a major piece of work on a theme or topic or issue which is relevant to their specialist journalism and/or public relations interest and worthy of a sustained in-depth inquiry.
   

• Transnational Professional Development - 10 credits
   

  Covers a series of topics related to intercultural and transnational communication, professional development and management/leadership.

How you'll learn
 

The course covers journalism theory and practice, and specialist knowledge and techniques specific to global journalism and public relations.
 

Each module is taught over approximately 11 weeks with formal teaching typically taking place over two full working days per week. The specialist staff include a former news and features writer with wide experience of global news reporting and academic research. Other tutors include specialists in magazine, digital media and emerging platforms, as well as public relations.
Teaching methods include:
 

• Lectures
   

• Seminars
   

• Tutorials
   

• Presentations
   

• Group projects
   

• Workshops
   

• Practical laboratory sessions
   

This course can be offered on a part-time basis. Whilst we would like to give you all the information about our part-time offering here, it is tailored for each course each year depending on the number of part-time applicants. Part-time students study alongside the full-time students, and cover exactly the same modules. Course modules are subject to change and where this happens continuing part-time students would be enrolled on equivalent or comparable modules. Therefore, the part-time teaching arrangements vary.

UK

Applicants should hold a good honours degree of 2.2 or above in any subject. Applications from candidates with relevant experience will be considered on an individual basis.
 

Each application will be considered on its merits and the final decision will be made by the course director. For information regarding what might amount to ‘a related subject’ or’ equivalent professional background’ please fill in our request information form.

English language requirements
 

IELTS: 7.0 overall, with no component lower than 5.5

UK

£10,600 per year

International Fees

£16,950 per year

International Pathways 2022 Scholarship

You could enjoy a £3,000 reduction in tuition fees.

Our high-quality foundation, international year one and pre-masters courses are for international students who do not meet the requirements for direct entry to their preferred Coventry University undergraduate or postgraduate course. We can support you to achieve the academic and/or English grades you need and help you gain the personal and professional skills required to study at university.

We want to encourage ambitious international students like you to study at Coventry University, so we’ve secured extra financial support for you worth £3,000, to help with the cost of tuition fees, living expenses and accommodation.

The scholarship application deadline is:

September 2022 intake: 31 July 2022

On successful completion of this course, you should know how to:
 

• Create globally-aware content that exhibit global awareness, to professional standards, for digital, broadcast, print or social media.
   

• Understand how global journalism and PR work and how they relate to politics, international relations and business
   

You will be able to:
 

• Apply a wide range of journalism and communication skills and knowledge to the production of globally-aware content that exhibit global awareness, to professional standards.
   

• Work creatively, sustainably and independently within professional situations, employing a range of journalism and public relations strategies and techniques.
   

• Critically evaluate and analyse the broad range of factors that impinge upon professional and creative activities within global journalism and the broader communications industry.
   

• Demonstrate the ability to identify and successfully engage with a range of audiences, genres and media platforms within global journalism and public relations.
   

• Feel prepared when applying for job roles within media, communication and PR.
   

This course prepares you for a broad range of positions in regional, national or international journalism, media, communications and PR – as a researcher, reporter, writer, editor or presenter, for example.
 

Career prospects are vast and varied, from established national and international media outlets, broadcasting organisations, newspapers and magazines, to emerging broadcast contexts, such as web-based text journalism, web-TV and web-radio.
 

Our Faculty of Arts and Humanities Talent Team is on hand to offer tailored career and enterprise support if you wish to gain employment or take advantage of professional practice opportunities within course specific industries2. The course equips students for work in a wider range of careers that require transferable knowledge and skills such as global awareness, research, writing and communication with specific or general audiences including via various media. Our dedicated enterprise officers also can offer valuable assistance on how to begin as a freelancer/entrepreneur.