Some companies let you shadow their workers and ask a few questions, while others make the most of your presence to get the tasks done that nobody else wants to do (i.e. photocopying, tea-making and general cleaning). Key 103, however, has been completely different. From the get-go, I have been thrown into activities at the deep end, which is really how I function best, by doing.
Without wanting to sound like a rubbish version of a rather popular Craig David song, here's how the week went:
On Monday, I went out onto the streets to collect some voxes about how some ladies feel about breastfeeding, and whether they think a new government scheme to encourage mums to do it for longer is a good idea. I had a mini panic attack when I got back to the office and couldn't find the file on the dictaphone. I thought that maybe, by pressing stop, I had somehow deleted it and thought that all my hard work would be for nothing. (It's not easy trying to get people on the street to talk to you when you have a microphone in your hand, people are a lot shyer than you'd think!) Luckily, it was on there and everything was fine. Phew. A woman did start talking over me though before I had finished asking the question, and I was told I had ruined a really good sound bite there. Lesson learned: Keep questions to a minimum!
On Tuesday, on the way into the office, I heard the voxes I had collected being used in the news bulletins. Happy days! In the news that day, the aftermath of the typhoon in the Philippines was taking precedence, so I was asked to find if there were any Filipinos in the Manchester area. I found the details of a gentleman called Ramil, and organised an interview with him for 1pm that day. He came in, with a colleague, and I interviewed the pair of them. It was an incredibly moving interview as they had at least 14 friends and relatives over there and they didn't know if they were safe and well due to the lack of communication. During some parts of the interview, they were on the edge of tears. I had another dictaphone dilemma when the batteries died halfway through, but luckily, the machine is apparently cleverer than I am and I didn't lose any data. I started learning how to edit audio, and I then wrote up the interview, which is now online at Key 103's page. They were so grateful for the coverage and he sent me some text messages thanking me for the opportunity. Best of all is that later on that night, he got in touch to let me know that all of his friends and family had been located and they were all now in a safe place. It was so sweet of him to let me know, I was really touched.
Wednesday was by far the scariest yet most exciting day. I was signed off to use Key 103's company cars, and was told to get some voxes from some firemen who were on strike over their pension dispute. Fine... in theory. I was given the keys to a smart car, and I had never driven one before. It's a semi-automatic, meaning that it had no clutch, and I spent about 10 minutes trying to figure out how to put the blasted thing into reverse. I invited another work experience girl to come along for the ride, and I bet she wished she hadn't. I don't think 'fearing for her life' would be too extreme a term. Granted, I didn't crash or kill anyone, but I got lost a couple of times. The firemen had a good laugh at me when I couldn't figure out how to reverse it. Women drivers eh? We recorded the voxes, and the plan was to send them directly from an iphone to the studio, but we had technical difficulties, so it didn't work. So, I was instructed to go back to the studio asap to drop it off.
Still, I managed to get there in the end (a minor achievement in itself!) to interview...
STOOSHE
They had the song "Black Heart" in the charts not long ago, and they came to Wythenshawe to help the kids at a local primary school write a song about growing up in a deprived area. They were lovely to interview and are extremely talented ladies. I also got to interview a couple of the kids about the day and the organiser. So, I headed back to the office and practiced my editing some more on the pieces I had just got, which were used the following day. In the meanwhile, I wrote up the story for their page again.
That evening, I got a phone call from a guy I had met there from ITV/Granada who said he was really impressed with me, that I wrote extremely well and my attitude was excellent. He then told me to save his number, and said if I ever needed anything to just give him a call. So, rather cheekily I said "Well, I need a job...!" to which he replied "If I were in charge of handing jobs out, I would give you one in a heartbeat, but I will definitely sort out some work experience for you". How good is that?!
On Thursday, I saw the whole news story process from start to finish, I went out onto the streets, got some voxes to see if people are excited about the Christmas markets, came back to the office, edited the audios and then wrote up the news stories, ready to be read out. It was such a useful thing to do, and the Head of News gave me lots of useful advice as to how to make the audios tighter and how to make the news stories more to their style.
Finally, on Friday, I went back for the official opening of the Christmas Markets and spoke to Councillor Pat Karney and Fine Time Fontayne, who has been in lots of things such as Corrie, Emmerdale, Heartbeat and The Bill.
I then edited the audios for the newsreader to use and spent the rest of the day organising the office.
All in all, it has been an incredible week! I am so so lucky to have been entrusted with so much responsibility, and they have sent me out to do so much alone.
Let's see what next week brings! xx
