introducing interactive media programmes
The School of Social Sciences, Media and Cultural Studies at UEL, where we are located, offers a broad range of interactive media programmes across levels, from foundation, through undergraduate and MA to PhD. At undergraduate level, there are a number of single and combined honours programmes in interactive media.
Interactive media practice and production are central to our work at UEL. All staff members have practical or professional interactive media experience, whether working commercially, in community settings, or as digital artists. Many have won grants, prizes and awards for their practical work. For example, in 2004 a team from The Rix Centre were awarded a large grant from the Department for Trade and Industry and the Economic and Social Research Council to research and develop a multimedia environment for people with learning disabilities. In 2005, Dave Chapman was awarded funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council for a soundscape and photographic installation at Gunpowder Park in the Lee Valley.
Most staff continue their interactive media practice whilst working at UEL so they can keep up-to-date with developments in the field and bring these developments to bear in their teaching. Visiting lecturers to our teaching programmes are often working simultaneously in interactive media professions, so our students benefit from direct contact with practical expertise. Guest lecturers to date work in the computer games industry, online television channels, the open source movement, new media companies, art and architecture agencies, music and postproduction studios and as curators/directors of media centres.
All our programmes offer students the opportunity to develop practical and professional expertise. Undergraduates get the opportunity to work with real clients on live projects, and can choose to work for clients on their final year projects if they wish. One such project, produced for the National Archive's Moving Here migration history arhive, was critically acclaimed in Internet magazine - visit www.movinghere.org.uk/games/default.htm to play the multimart game.
Postgraduates on MA programmes are able to undertake work placement schemes with the media sector that are orientated to those who interested in taking their professional career in a new direction or wish to consolidate newly acquired skills. In addition, collaborations with the interactive media research centres outlined above have offered a wide range of exciting production opportunities to students, some of whom have then become employees of the centres.
There are a number of other departments at our Docklands campus which offer practical and professional experience to our students, including the Talent Lab Media Hub, an award-winning spin-off media production company, and the Knowledge Dock Network, whose remit is to help businesses make effective technology choices.
The Multimedia Production Centre (MPC) at UEL's Docklands Campus is our comprehensive production facility, serving the production needs of students in the School of Social Sciences, Media and Cultural Studies, as well as other Schools based on the Campus. The facilities range across the whole spectrum of modern production technologies - press media, video, photography, computer graphics, and multimedia and web authoring. The MPC runs a large range of workshops, from the purely introductory to the professional.
The MPC includes a number of Apple Mac and PC labs with different kinds of configuration and software, a TV studio, video edit suites, a radio studio, an audio arts area, recording studio and editing booths, a photography studio and darkroom, a tape-slide facility and a general art studio. The MPC assists students to explore themes raised on their courses (relating, for example, to representation, realism, audiences, cultural difference) through group media productions, to engage with theoretical issues, and to acquire technical, creative and organisational skills in multimedia, video, audio/radio, tape/slide, photography and various fusions of these media.
Our school offers a broad range of interactive media programmes across levels, from foundation, through undergraduate and MA to PhD. At undergraduate level, there are a number of single and combined honours programmes in interactive media. Undergraduate students take six modules in each level of their studies (eighteen in total) made up of a combination of compulsory and optional modules. The structure of each undergraduate programme is outlined below. To apply for an undergraduate programme, complete an application form available from the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS) at ucas.ac.uk. Some of our programmes also have a February start, for which you should apply directly to UEL . For information about entry criteria for undergraduate programmes, visit this page on our website: www.uel.ac.uk/courses/choosing/requiremnts.htm.
Application forms for postgraduate programmes can also be obtained directly from UEL. For more information, go to the 'how to apply' page on UEL's website at: www.uel.ac.uk/courses/how_to_apply/index.htm#pg.
