My name is Mark Briggs. I am 20 years old and I would describe myself as a young aspiring journalist whose currently studying Multimedia Journalism at Bournemouth University. I am very interested in sports journalism but I have decided to dedicate this blog towards politics, and in particular coverage of the US Presidential Election in 2016.
Despite the fact I spent the earliest years of my life in Oxford my family moved to Devon and I have grown up in Exmouth which is a small seaside town in the heart of the West Country. Moving down there enabled me to have my first experience as a journalist by getting the chance to co-present a youth programme on a community radio station named Bay FM. Since then I eventually moved on to having my own three hour sports show in a prime slot on Saturday afternoons before I ventured off to university.
Even though it still feels like early days in regard to my university life I already feel like I have had so much more experience under my belt. I joined the student radio station and was fortunate enough to be given a sports show in the same slot as my previous programme at Bay. Furthermore, for one of my pieces of coursework I got to interview a local MP about his views on expanding AFC Bournemouth’s stadium, as well as going down to a press conference and asking a few questions to Premier League manager Eddie Howe, something that I consider as a major coup.
So why are you blogging about politics you ask? Good question. Funnily enough I was struggling to pick a fourth A Level a few years ago and after a school trip to the Houses of Parliament I became very politically engaged, and ended up putting it down as one of my choices. It was almost as if someone had opened up a whole new world to me and from then on I have fallen in love with it. Many thanks of course to my fantastic teacher Tom Roegele at Exeter College who is so passionate about the subject and without him I wouldn’t where I am today.