The Real World News unit is part of the QUT Journalism program. Led by Dr Michael Scully, journalism students are trained to undertake professional interviews.
Students have to reach out to the “expert” and pre-interview them to define the scope of the conversation BEFORE they arrive in the QUT Z6 TV studio. Once in the studio, a one-on-one sit-down interview, in a traditional newsroom format, is undertaken and recorded before being posted to YouTube.
This semester, the expert interview subjects were five of the 12 QUT Budding Entrepreneur scholarship holders: Sarah Eisenmenger, Coby Lee Davis, Zac McDonnell, Elise Berry and Christina Lucas were each interviewed. These students hold Budding Entrepreneur Scholarships to recognise the entrepreneurial action they were engaged in while at secondary education and to support them to keep going while they study. In addition to financial support, the scholarships support recipients with one-on-one mentoring, a connected community of entrepreneurs and tailored business assistance through extra-curricular learning programs, while they study at QUT.
Scholarships are funded by the university as well as entrepreneurial QUT Alumni who see the benefits of supporting the next generation of innovators and entrepreneurs. Matt Fairhurst, CEO and co-founder of Skedulo supports one of the scholarships as does John Stainton, the powerhouse producer behind the Crocodile Hunter franchise and other ventures such as Eat Street and the new Rangelands Outback Camp out of Winton.
As a learning process, Dr Scully says, “My students LOVED the experience because they got to practice the craft of journalism in a setting that yields a broadcast-quality conversation. We all really enjoyed learning about the Budding Entrepreneur students and their exciting work.”
Professor Rowena Barrett, QUT’s Pro Vice-Chancellor (Entrepreneurship) says, “the student-to-student engagement is invaluable in building connections, while the professionalism of the resulting interviews speaks to QUT’s ‘real world’ commitments.”
Three of the interviews are:
Elise Berry’s interview with student journalist Victoria Hunt view it here
Zac McDonnell’s interview with student journalist Salwa Suandi view it here
Coby Lee Davis’ interview with student journalist Spenser Wallace view it here