Journalism and PR at Sunderland
Our students have production facilities that are the envy of many academic establishments. The David Puttnam Media Centre is one of the UK's most advanced centres for training media students with industry standard facilities. The 2007/2008 National Student Survey results showed that our students were the most satisfied students in the North East and the 18th most satisfied in the UK, from a list of more than 140 institutions. The David Puttnam Media Centre received a £1.5m upgrade in the autumn of 2009 and our facilities now boast:
- Four Journalism suites, each housing 18 Apple iMacs running the Leopard operating system for design applications and video editing. There is an additional open access project completion suite which houses 20 iMacs and colour laser printing
- Broadcast Journalism Newsroom with 17 workstations plus an Avid Utility server, Sky feed and 2 x 40" plasma screens. Each workstation has newscutter, burli and ENPS
- Suite of eight seminar rooms fully equipped with: audio visual technologies; internet connection; dual platform laptops; and dvd/vhs/cd playout systems. Two rooms have the above equipment with the addition of Blu-ray playout
- Five radio studios, including a drama studio, a transmission suite for community radio station 107 Spark FM and a 20 station digital audio post-production area complete with four voiceover booths.
- Live Sky feed and off-air recording facility, including DVD and Blu-ray recording, plus extensive footage archive/library
- Several film viewing areas for independent study
- A digital drama and production studio
- Professional recording equipment
- ISDN lines that link us to studios and stations all over the country
- 203 seat cinema with full HD projection, 7.1 surround sound facility and the capability to play 3D feature films
- Two broadcast quality TV Studios
- A green room with changing area and shower room
- Over 40 full HD tapeless field camera systems
- 4 Steadicam rigs plus dolly, track and mini crane
- 70 workstations with state-of-the-art HD Edit systems
- 20 station digital audio postproduction area
- 40 Avid non-linear edit suites
- New media suite
- Modern, attractive library on campus
- 107 Spark FM, the region's largest student radio station
- Creativitiworks, our business support unit for creative enterprise
- We are part of the BBC Education and Communities Partnership: Connect and Create
David Puttnam Media Centre 3D Tour
You can now tour the David Puttnam Media Centre online through our 3D tour. Click the link on the right to access the tour, or you can download it from the iPhone AppStore.
107 Spark fm
Our student radio station, 107 Spark FM, recently won a full-time, five-year community radio licence, which re-launched in September 2009. Through Spark Fm you can gain real-life work experience in our own radio studios and be heard across the city on FM, online and around the world. Many of our graduates now work for commercial stations across the country, such as Galaxy's breakfast presenter Karen Wight.
