Day 1:
During the first day at Beat on the 17th of October all the students were first led upstairs to the conference room to get a briefing on what the next week at Beat would look like. Before our tour of the building and studios we got to know each other over a quick introduction. We all then went to have a look around the state-of-the-art studios. We got a tour of both Beat and WLR studios. We were also notified that WLR’s studio is the most modern studio in all of Ireland. We then got a talk from Dean, one of Beats news and Breakfast presenters. Dean told us all about how he got into radio and what his typical day would look like.
At the end of the day all the students had to brainstorm ideas for what our segment –that was going to be aired the following Monday- would be about. We got split into groups of 2 and picked our topics. My group decided to do a segment about “The Effects of TikTok”.
Day 2:
On the second day we all got ready to head out to do our vox’s. We were split into 2 groups and while we waited for groups to come back, we filmed a few TikTok’s that would go up on Beat’s social media. We also took group photos for their website. We then got our professional pictures taken by Darren Rice which would be presented on the Thursday for the presentation.
When heading out to do our vox’s we all got a pop shield that went over our phone microphones, this was to make sure we could hear all the audio from the interviews perfectly. We set off to the streets of Ardkeen to get people's opinions, and for us it was their opinion on TikTok.
After we got back from doing our vox’s, we set off to editing our pieces. We used Adobe edition to edit our audios. It was great to learn how to edit the audio as I've never done anything like that before. It was really eye opening as we found it difficult to edit our audio in a week, when presenters could do that in just 30 minutes!
Day 3:
On the third day we got a talk from Niall, who’s a presenter and also edits and makes up schedules for most songs airing on the radio station. He told us all about what he does and how he schedules certain songs at peak hours (the hours with the most listeners).
We then interviewed Kya Douge who recently graduated from SETU with a sociology and physiology degree. We wanted to get a professional's thoughts on TikTok. During this interview we also got to learn about how the calls are recorded so that we are able to use the audio for our final segment.
We were then all called back up to the conference room where we had a workshop with a lawyer who is currently residing in California. She told us all about media and law and how to be careful when using images and audios as you may be copyrighted or sued.
Day 4:
On the fourth day at Beat we got to working on editing a minute of our segment that would be played at the presentation later that night to show our parents how we’ve been getting on and a little bit of what we’ve been doing.
We also got to interview Shauna David who is a Wexford TikToker who goes by the name “Shauna the Sheep” on the app. It was great to interview her as we had always known about her and it was an incredible moment to be able to speak to someone who you constantly see all over social media.
Shauna later on called us when we were all together in the conference room, this time she told us all about being in media and what her normal day would look like.
We all then went home, only to come back an hour later with our parents to attend the presentation. All our parents got to listen to one minute of each groups segment and then get a tour of the building!
Day 5:
On the fifth and final day we all got to working hard on finishing our segment. We then went into studio to record our links (a link is a section in-between pieces of audio where the presenter starts to speak, giving information or simply to say what’s coming next). It was difficult to know what to say, but after a lot of retakes we finally got it done.
We then all went back up to the conference room, where we all said our final goodbyes and exchanged numbers. It was sad to say goodbye as I felt I made so many new friends over the week. Overall, it was such a great experience and leaving Beat I definitely felt a lot more confident and surer about myself!