Interested in finding out about careers and employability at the School of Arts? Continue reading to find out about all our activities!
Our academic programmes combine academic rigour, personal development, life skills and career opportunities. Students develop key competencies and attributes graduate employers look for, both through the curriculum, and extracurricular activities offered by the school and other university services.
Our graduates have become theatre producers, literary managers, community theatre officers for local councils, theatre journalists, authors, scriptwriters for television, teachers, stand-up comedians, directors, event managers, drama teachers, performers and actors.
Our programmes contain a strong emphasis on employability within the curriculum. We help students to develop the creative competence they need to succeed in a future career in specific arts professions as well as the wider creative industries. The modules available on our programmes cover a range of professional practices as well as the opportunity to develop transferable skills.
Within Film and Media Studies, industry professionals are invited to talk about knowledge of the industry. A few recent examples:
- Itamar Stern from Lyft visited us to talk about sharing economy and digital media.
- Independent film maker Emma Hu is invited to talk about working in film industry as a Asian female director.
- Professionals from the PR industry are invited to talk about working as a PR in the digital age.
- Students studying film criticism were encouraged to sign up for the Young Film Programmers. Students are also prepared to write to industry standards – from style to quick turnaround and regular production of texts – and prepare them for the realities of the profession.
- Former Sight & Sound editor Nick James and film critics Jonathan Romney (Independent, Observer) and Larushka Ivan-Zadeh visited to give guest lectures.
- Film and Drama co-organised an event on adaptations of Malorie Blackman’s Nought & Crosses. This was a panel discussion with guest speakers Heather Agyepong (an actor who starred in the stage adaptation of the novel) and Preethi Mavahalli (an executive producer on the BBC adaptation).
- Kent graduate Amelia Mundy made a video essay for current students on the course which reflected on how her time in the School has impacted on her creative work. Amelia also joined us for a Q&A session with current students to discuss her experience working within the media industries.
- ‘Careers in Film and Media: Industry Speaker’ series, where we invite industry professionals to talk to students. Recent guests include Xin Feng, Founder of the Source Engine; Sajid Varda, Producer & Actor, CEO & Founder of UK Muslim Film, Becky Simms, CEO of Reflect Digital, and Steve Wynne, CEO of Strawberry Blond TV. Two of our recent graduates Shohini Ahuja and Enoch (Seun) Odubade, gave a talk on Graduating During a Global Pandemic.
- The School also has Podcasting Club, Writing Club, and Filmmaking Club to enable student to engage into productions of media contents and to develop other employability related skills.
In Music and Audio Technology, we run regular employability sessions for our students and through our Music Academic Partnership with UK Music, the umbrella organisation for the whole of the Music Industry, we have a regular flow of guest speakers and workshops held for our students. For example:
- George Ezra’s producer, Cam Blackwood spoke to our students about careers in production.
- Our students attended BBC Introducing Live, which provides an opportunity for our students to meet industry operatives, attend seminars and meet people from all the different disciplines within the Music Industry.
- We have guest lectures from numerous industry professionals including most recently, Nicola Dowers and Debbie Rogerson from the BBC Synchronisation and Clearance Team
For our Drama and Theatre students, there is an arts-wide module called Arts Internship. It happens in the Spring Term of the students’ final year, and it involves them doing a 15-day internship in an arts-related job. We also have other opportunities including:
- This year, students have undertaken internships teaching drama in a secondary school, supporting a European artist called Thierry Geoffroy, and working on a low-budget horror film.
- There is also an option to do study at the School of Arts with a year in industry between your second year and final year.
- The School of Arts also operates a Graduate Theatre Company; most recently, Graduate Theatre Company halucid_, has been successful in securing funding as part of Screen South‘s ‘New Creatives’ scheme.
- Head of Comedy and Popular Performance, Olly Double, hosts the Proper Job Gradcast, in which Olly interviews Kent drama graduates working in the arts about how they got from graduation to where they are now. The most recent episode was launched during Creative Careers Week with Kent alumnus, George Weightman, professional actor working in theatre, film, and voice actor for audiobooks.