Martin Samuel, the Daily Mail sports writer and columnist, has today criticised ‘half-baked’media courses, urging aspiring journalists to pursue academic subjects instead.
In a piece on vocational courses, Samuel – who, as well as being chief sports writer, writes one news opinion piece per week – said ‘traditional subjects’are more useful.
‘I am often asked if I know a good course for someone who wants to be a journalist,’he wrote. ‘And I do. English. Or history, or politics, or economics.
‘Traditional subjects. Not some half-baked media studies class, because there is not much point having a journalist who knows his subdecks from his crossheads but thinks Iran and Iraq are the same country (believe me, it happened).
‘Academic education broadens horizons and experiences; premature emphasis on vocation narrows them.”
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