Charlotte Ryan, MA Multimedia Journalism with Distinction

I had been working as a freelance journalist for two years, but wanted to improve and crucially, get a good job. The course helped me with both.

The lecturers were really approachable and got to know us all. I took ill halfway through the year and it’s really thanks to their help that I graduated at all! I had gallstones and was in hospital for a week then it took a while to recuperate. The lecturers were really understanding, gave me extensions on deadlines and even recorded classes for me so I could keep up.

I finished my Masters in the summer and completed an internship in London with the financial and business company Bloomberg, before starting with them full-time in September.

It’s a big news operation with at least 400 people and when I went for the interview at Bloomberg, everybody had a Masters so the GCU degree was crucial. I’m a rotational reporter, which means I’m on a new beat every couple of months. So far I’ve covered bonds and foreign exchange so I’ve had to brush up on my financial knowledge.

The main focus with Bloomberg is speed. Clients want the news quickly so you have to work fast. My first rotation on my internship was Politics, the Monday after Brexit, which was a baptism of fire. Then I went on to company news, where I pitched a story on the fact Scottish Whisky was experiencing a boost-  I interviewed shop owners, phoned up distilleries and wrote a feature on it. I was really proud of it as it was an idea I came up with, and it’s one of the only things I’ve written that my mum read!

I always really liked writing and I love the fact in journalism every day is different and you get to learn about new subjects all the time. I’d like to keep working for Bloomberg and one day would love to work in an overseas bureau.