Rhodri Phillips
"I found the course intense and testing but extremely rewarding."
Rhodri Phillips is now a reporter with the Mail on Sunday.
Frequently Asked Questions
- Will I get a job?
We can’t give a 100 per cent guarantee, but we can point to a track record which says that pretty much everyone who successfully completed the course over the past 10 years has been offered a job in news journalism.
Our trainees are highly sought after by editors and many candidates end up being offered several jobs during the course.
- Will I be offered a place on the course
We take recruitment to the course extremely seriously as our aim is for those paying their own way through to be as talented if not more so than those already in jobs who are sent on the course.
As a result, you can expect to have to attend a group interview, set several written assessments and be interviewed on a one-to-one basis.
If you are successful at getting on the course, however, you can be pretty sure that you have what it takes to be a journalists.
- How tough is the course?
Don’t be under any illusions; it is hard work. From day one your day will be tightly timetabled from 9am to 5pm and you will be expected to do an hour of shorthand homework every night. If you are looking for an easy ride, you better go and find another journalism course.
The majority of the people on our course are already employed as journalists and are being sponsored by their employers, so the culture is the same as you would expect at work. Attendance is compulsory, it is business dress throughout and for many of those on the course, failing exams will mean no job.
You can be expected to be treated just the same as a privately funded delegate.
We believe if you are making this kind of investment in your future, you are entitled to be learning 100 per cent of the time – and that’s just what you will get from the 17 weeks you spend with us. That’s probably why editors like our graduates so much.
- How do you compare to other courses?
We think we are different to most others. At a university or college-based course, you will find the courses are often longer and less intensive. We are proud of our pass rates in shorthand and the other exams and can show a record of progression into work that is second to none.
But it is our closeness to the industry that probably makes us stand out more than anything.
Being based in a big media company means you are never far from the action, you will have the opportunity to do real stories almost from day one and in such a fast-changing industry, you can be confident you are being trained in the skills required of today’s new breed of journalist.