Magazine Academy invites students on the 18 PTC-accredited journalism and publishing higher education courses across the UK to compete in three categories: New Magazine Concept, New Digital Product Concept and New Student Magazine. The competition is backed by Dovetail Services and founding supporters Polestar and UPM.
The New Student Magazine category was given to the University of Sheffield for Poppy, with the University of Sheffield also named runner-up for N? Mode and Cardiff University highly commended for Wonder Girl.
The New Magazine Concept category was won by students from the University of Sheffield for Bollywood First Take. City University, London was named runner up in the category for its gardening magazine concept Squash and the University of Central Lancashire was highly commended for Pixels.
The winner of the New Digital Concept category was Festival Business from PMA Media Training.
Gill Hudson, Editor in Chief of Reader’s Digest and Chair of the PTC Editorial Training Consultants Committee (ETCC), said: “Attracting and retaining the very best new talent is vital to the future of our industry and ETCC members are involved in the accreditation of the 18 PTC-accredited courses, ensuring they help students acquire the skills and knowledge employers need them to have. And, of course, we support the Magazine Academy event as it underscores one of our principal aims, which is to help talented new graduates onto the first rung of the industry ladder.”
The Magazine Academy event also served to recognise the 16 students that have taken part in MagNet, the industry’s first ever co-ordinated diversity mentoring scheme, developed by the PTC in conjunction with Joanna Abeyie of Shine Media. The project matches students from under-represented groups studying on PTC-accredited courses with volunteer mentors already employed in the industry.
Nicholas Brett said: “We know managing diversity helps businesses reach out to more diverse markets and achieve new levels of creativity and innovation. This is a really exciting project and I encourage all PPA’s members to continue to support the scheme and engage with outstanding new talent.”
The event at Vinopolis on October 19 also served as a graduation ceremony for delegates on PPA’s professional qualifications. Dennis Publishing supremo Felix Dennis was present to name Patrick Kelly of The Art Newspaper as the recipient of the Felix Dennis New Publisher of the Year Award, which comes with an endowment of £5,000 funded personally by Dennis.
The award is presented to a delegate on the PPA Diploma in Publishing who through their knowledge of publishing dynamics and publishing skills acquired on the course has added value to their business.
Nicholas Brett, Chair of the PTC Board and Deputy Managing Director and Group Editorial Director at BBC Magazines, said: “Despite the challenging economic climate we remain committed to promoting and rewarding excellence. The PTC’s strategy is to work alongside publishers to drive up standards in training and development, making a difference to skills across the industry. And we know from the feedback we receive that we still provide high-quality, leading-edge training that helps media owners improve the bottom line.”
