Student reporting abroad: An international programme called journalism reporting field trips

Abstract

A programme organised by the author for journalism students to do practical work overseas has seen small groups engaged in intercultural learning and working as foreign correspondents for campus-based media outlets. Since 2000, 60 students have joined nine tours of 10–20 days in nine countries of Europe and the Asia-Pacific region. They obtain credit for a full elective subject, e.g. an individual study unit, and may negotiate additional credits. The project’s rationale was that while practice focuses the mind on essential communication tasks, practice in distant and unfamiliar settings intensifies the experience. It replicates journalistic practice of overseas correspondents encountering ‘high risk and high returns’: more difficulty, more headlines and colour. This practice dovetails with increasing internationalisation of the curriculum. A literature has been consulted identifying main pedagogi­cal arguments for study abroad, and present day demands on the academy. Leading researchers in this field, viz Jane Knight propose ‘non-ideological’ definitions of internationalised education as a process responding to ‘real world’ demands. The investigation concludes that such programmes can occupy a valuable place in core curricula; relate to increasing demand for ‘real world’ learning and internationalisation, and can be integrated into degree structures without undue stain on resources.