by | January 26, 2012

ICT debate after teaching is a ‘mess’

Education Secretary Michael Gove’s frank admission that ICT teaching in schools is a “mess” with children “bored out of their minds” during lessons, has resulted in a special Coventry Conversation set to take place next Wednesday 1st February, to debate if ICT in schools really is ‘crap’.

The group discussion, will take place in The Hub at 1pm. Instead of one speaker like it is most weeks, there will be a teacher, an academic and an adviser. They will all be representing different viewpoints and angles on the statement ‘ICT teaching in school is crap!’

It is set to be a fiery debate following Gove’s recent comments. Student participation is encouraged and you will be able to put across your questions to the debaters towards the end.

Gove’s admittance on the failings of the current curriculum was delivered at the recent BETT Conference, an annual show which aims to showcase the use of information technology in education.

Written by Amy Haycock. Continue reading →

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by | January 26, 2012

Varsity Day Writing Competition

Do you have a passion for writing? Or even just a passion for Sports?

Then this is for you. We’re looking for a 400 word (max) quirky article about Varsity Day.
It’s simple. Send in your experiences or articles on Varsity Day to ryan_b_1989@hotmail.com
The winner will be given a free ticket to watch Coventry take on Warwick at Varsity Day with their article published in the next Source Magazine edition.

Written by Ryan Beasley.

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by | January 26, 2012

The Art of Successful Radio- Adrian Van Klaveren

“We are news and sport.” is how Adrian Van Klaveren described BBC Radio 5 Live. Adrian is the controller of both BBC Radio 5 Live and BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra. He spoke at a Coventry Conversation about BBC Radio 5 Live and Radio can be successful.

 Adrian started off with some facts about radio in Britain and surprised many saying that there are forty-eight million listeners a week. He linked this with the idea that radio, an old medium, still fits into modern life. People have a personal connection with radio and he went on to say that Britain possibly have the best radio in the world.

 “You can use it affectively as a secondary activity.” is how Adrian justified the fact that radio still exists in modern life. He described how people can listen to the radio whilst driving, cooking, doing work and all sorts of other scenarios and you can still take all the information in without having to fully interact with it.

Written By Alex Maidment

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by | January 24, 2012

Frontline: A Year of Journalism and Conflict

Nine Coventry University students from different stages in their studying journalism and media went to a trip to London on Tuesday, 17th January, to visit a Sky News exhibition and the main newsroom of the BBC Television centre.

The exhibition on the Arab Spring and how Sky News broadcast the shocking events in the Middle East took place in the Embankment Galleries of Somerset House. Large images on the walls, notes under them and a variety of filmed material told the story of the uprising in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Syria. An approximately 8-minute documentary captured the story of Gaddafi and his last days. News reports from those thrilling days showed the fear, the torture, the protests, the battles, the joy and everything the Arab World went through in 2011.

Other documentaries contained the stories of reporters who were in the hot spots. The most impressive among them was the story of Alex Crowford who was trapped with her team for three days in Tripoli during the rebels there in August last year. She told that although she and her team did not talk about the possibility of death those days, everyone was actually thinking “I am not going to get alive out of here!”

Written by Galya Dimitrova.

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by | January 20, 2012

Producing BBC Comedy – Jon Plowman

“Comedy, I think, is the most difficult bit of telly to do.” Is what Jon Plowman, BBC Comedy Producer, said during his Coventry Conversation. Jon is well-known for his producing role on ‘Absolutely Fabulous’ and many other BBC comedy programs and has been working in Television for over thirty years.

The talk began with Jon describing the ‘Absolutely Fabulous’ Christmas episode which had an audience of just over seven million on Christmas Day night. Just a few days later, the views had gone up to twelve million through the use of the BBC iPlayer making it one of the biggest increases in viewings over such a short time period.

Before producing the recent ‘Absolutely Fabulous’ episodes, Jon hadn’t worked on the program as a producer for around eight or nine years. He said that it is a notorious show and that he used to moan because Jennifer Saunders, who stars in the show, used to write the scripts late on.

Written by Alex Maidment.

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by | January 17, 2012

A lot to look forward to this summer… The 2012 Olympics

The London 2012 Olympics are looking to be a huge national event where everyone should get involved. Coventry are lucky enough to be hosting twelve Olympic football games. Tom Clift, Operations Manager, 2012 Games, Coventry City Council, spoke more about it during a Coventry Conversation.

Tom is a Coventry University graduate and is former President of the Student’s Union. He has been involved in London 2012 since 2003. He began the talk by saying he is not a spokesperson for the Olympics and joked that he has nothing to do with tickets having asked how many people managed to get tickets from the audience, to which not many hands went up. Some impressive facts rolled of Tom’s tongue as he explained that Britain finished all the main 2012 Olympic venues around a year before the Olympics which he said was practically: “Unheard of.”

He quickly moved on to what Coventry and Warwickshire are doing during the Olympic games and he announced that the Ricoh Arena will host 12 Olympic football games, seven women’s and men’s. The Ricoh Arena will however be known as the City of Coventry Stadium during the 2012 Olympics because of advertising purposes but will be known as the Ricoh Arena again, straight after the games finish. The first Olympic football game to be played in Coventry will be on July 25th and there are still tickets if you want to go and watch.

Written by Alex Maidment.

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