Program Overview

BA (Hons) Multimedia Journalism

The BA (Hons) Multimedia Journalism course is geared towards inquiring and creative thinkers seeking a career in journalism and the creative media industries. This vocationally focused course provides practical training to equip students with high-level multimedia, digital research, and communication skills, so that they are ready for employment in the fast-paced media industry.

Course Overview

From breaking news to cultural reviews, sports reporting to in-depth investigations, the course helps students scrutinize, interrogate, and report on the issues that really matter. Throughout this hands-on course, students will be provided with co-curricular opportunities to work on live events and current affairs, both nationally and internationally, gaining experience of working to professional deadlines.

Features and Benefits

• Modules are led by accomplished journalists, including current and former reporters and editors.
• The course encourages students to find their own creative identity and express themselves through a variety of digital content, media, and genres.
• Throughout the degree, each year will offer increasing flexibility, allowing students to pursue their own interests through a range of options, including magazine, digital audio and video, or arts journalism.
• Students may have the opportunity to take the four-year route, spending a year studying abroad, or boost their career prospects with a placement in industry.
• All students have access to high-spec, professional television and radio studios, a newsroom, and edit suites situated in a dedicated wing of the Grosvenor East building, giving them the practical experience they'll need to become journalists.

Accreditations, Awards, and Endorsements

• The course has received an overall gold status in the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF), meaning it's rated as an outstanding university for student experience.
• 90.5% of students were positive about teaching staff being good at explaining things, according to the National Student Survey 2025 (NSS).

Year 1

In year 1, students start to learn the core skills of finding and researching a story, interviewing, and reporting using a broad range of digital tools. They also learn the purpose and role of journalists in society, including the importance of a free press for supporting democratic processes around the world.

Core Modules

• Media Making For Journalists: This module introduces the theory and practice of creating digital media assets for journalism, including industry-standard methods of production, storage, and manipulation of video, audio, and photography.
• Journalism Skills: This module covers conceptual and skills development relevant to contemporary newspaper and online reporting, including a basic introduction to essential media law and ethics.
• Journalism and Media in Society: This module examines the purpose and principles of journalism, introducing students to the key debates in journalism studies and exploring journalistic reporting of issues and debates in present-day society.
• Digital Publishing: This module focuses on developing essential skills for online journalism. Students learn how to write articles for the web, use SEO and analytics to plan and design content for online audiences, and use a content management system to create and upload content for the web.

Year 2

As students progress to year 2, they build on their core journalism skills, working in the dedicated newsroom, television, and radio studios to produce multi-platform news content, while developing their design, editing, and production skills using a range of industry-standard software. At this level, students also study media law and ethics to give them the knowledge and confidence to produce legally safe journalism in an ethical and inclusive way, as well as how to report on court proceedings.

Core Modules

• News Production and Photojournalism: This module covers production and editing for print and visual journalism. Students generate content and consider effective page design for print and digital products, presented via news and photojournalism.
• Media Law and Regulation: This module covers the essential legislation that affects the work of journalists in the UK. Students learn how to produce journalism in a legally safe and ethical way within the British Legal System and the industry's professional regulatory frameworks.
• Broadcast News: This module builds on and develops students' understanding of the principles and practice of the production of multi-platform news content for broadcast, including studio-based video and audio content.

Option Modules

• Music, Culture and Arts Journalism: This module is designed to enable students to develop an appreciation of music, arts, and culture journalism and equip them with the capability to produce specialist arts journalism to industry standards.
• Digital Humanities: This module enables students to apply computer-based technology, effectively and creatively, to the study of human society and culture. Students work in groups to live briefs from industry partners, with projects centering around the themes of sustainability, community, and social justice.

Year 3

If students take the four-year placement route, year 3 will be spent on placement. If they take the four-year study abroad route, year 3 will be spent studying overseas.

In their final year, students are required to create a portfolio of original journalism, rooted in the real world – real people, real issues, and real events. They are encouraged to consider their role as journalists in a global context while exploring the contemporary challenges facing those working in this industry across the world. Students also develop different media business models while developing transferable entrepreneurial skills.

Core Modules

• Journalism Portfolio: This module provides a platform for the research, design, and execution of an independent journalism project. Students devise their own topic with supervisory support from staff.
• Law and Ethics for Multimedia Journalism: This module builds on knowledge acquired from the Level 5 module Media Law and Regulation and explores in greater depth the legal and ethical issues affecting journalists.
• Entrepreneurship for Journalists: This module reflects current professional practice and standards, equipping students with the transferable professional skills, knowledge, and insight to operate across different business models both collaboratively and independently.

Option Modules

• Audio and Video for Digital Storytelling: This module builds on students' understanding of the digital audio and video skills and methods employed by journalists. Students explore the theory of audio/video journalism and storytelling in relation to contemporary debates and industry expectations.
• Magazine Journalism: This module covers the basic principles of magazine production and of targeting content and design to a specific audience, readership, and market. The module builds on previously acquired knowledge and skills, and students are required to produce legally and ethically sound articles suitable for a stated readership.

Study and Assessment

• Year 1: 25% lectures, seminars, or similar; 75% independent study
• Year 2: 25% lectures, seminars, or similar; 75% independent study
• Year 3: 100% placement (optional)
• Year 4: 20% lectures, seminars, or similar; 80% independent study
• Year 1: 100% coursework
• Year 2: 100% coursework
• Year 3: 100% placement (optional)
• Year 4: 100% coursework

Entry Requirements

• Typical Offer: 104-112 UCAS tariff points
• IELTS Score: 6.0 overall with no component below 5.5, taken within two years of the course start date

Fees and Funding

Tuition fees for the 2026/27 academic year are still being finalized for all courses. Information on 2025/26 standard undergraduate fees for UK/Channel Islands and EU/Non-EU international students is available.

Careers Support and Prospects

• Employed or in Further Study: 88.7% of UK-domiciled, full-time, first-degree graduates are employed or in further study 15 months after graduation, according to the Graduate Outcomes survey 2021/22 leavers, HESA data.
• The rapidly changing digital media and creative industries offer career opportunities in an extremely wide range of sectors, including print journalism, digital publishing and editing, broadcasting, researching, media development, freelance writing, specialist journalism, working for news agencies, public relations departments, and public sector press departments.

Related Courses

• BA (Hons) English and Multimedia Journalism
• BA (Hons) Film and Media Studies