Students enjoy tour of the BBC

Students were able to learn about the BBC’s different activities through TV, Online and Radio broadcasting. They were even given the opportunity to try their hand in front of the camera reading the news, presenting the weather and also starring in a radio play!

Read more from our students about this amazing experience!

Parmida (Iran):

‘The BBC tour was the most interesting tour I have ever had!

The tour guides were very friendly and explained everything in detail for us. The newsroom amazed me because of how big it was and the technology was very updated. We were able to do a news broadcast as a practice and also a short radio play for fun as well. I participated in both and thought they were extremely interesting. I am more interested in camera work and TV broadcasting so I think that I will focus on it in my time at university as well. I wish that we could see other studios as well but of course it is a working place and there are security reasons as well. Overall, I really enjoyed this tour and it was very fun!’

Akshay (Tanzania)

‘The BBC Trip was a great experience. I felt it helped me by providing me knowledge of how broadcasting works. I have become more open minded and more creative from learning how they do what they do. I learnt that they have lots of technology, facilities and equipment that help to gather information instead of having to look around for it. The staff is divided into groups and they have a special team to research each different show that the BBC has. This makes it more organised and quicker for their news and shows to be produced.

They have capacity for up to 4500 staff members: 5 floors of studios, with a different studio for Domestic and International News programmes and another for weather forecasts. Most things are not the same in real life as they look in the studio. It looks very different when you compared to it on TV. Overall I enjoyed the trip and learnt a lot! I also had a great time bonding with my classmates and teacher’.

Fiammetta (Italy)

‘The tour was very engaging: it not only illustrated the functions of each department, explaining how news and information come and pass through different broadcasts (TV, Online-website and Radio), but they also involved visitors with anecdotes and curiosities upon the BBC’s history.

“Inform, educate and entertain”, were the BBC’s three main objectives established by the first general director, John Reith. The guides introduced us into this media giant and moreover, they allowed us to experience working in the studios, such as presenting the news and weather on a green background, or storytelling on the radio.

It was surprising to find out how people and environments transform reality to the screen. Witnessing the actual course of this transformation, I questioned to what extent representations of reality can be perfected, and even distorted, through the media’s tools. The BBC indeed plays a significant role in the process of the faithful representation of world events. As it is available via a licence fee, the UK Corporation is historically acknowledged for objectivity and providing non-bias information.

My favourite part of the tour was definitely the radio studio. The guides showed us pictures of popular artists’ concerts, including Bon Jovi, Elton John, and Michael Buble, which took place there. And they surprisingly confessed that the BBC had paid those singers no more than £66 as the event offered them consistent promotional support. Furthermore, what most impressed me in relation to the history of the BBC, which was initially created as Radio Broadcasting, was an incredible episode occurred during the second bombing attack on the building. The guides let us listen an audio recorded on the day of the attack: the radio host was presenting news when the bomb was dropped on highest floors, not provoking evident effects on the presenter who impassively continued his program. That was astonishing!’