Islington schoolchildren report on the cost-of-living crisis, new teachers and numbers day for News Club • City, University of London

News Club returns with six Islington primary schools, thanks to Professor Emerita Lis Howell and the Widening Participation team.

By Eve Lacroix (Senior Communications Officer), Published Tuesday, 26^th March 2024

Are school meals getting smaller because of the cost-of-living crisis?

Around 130 children filmed a news segment about their schools and their local Islington borough at the broadcasting studio at City, University of London as part of the News Club project.

In the weeks leading up to filming, the schoolchildren worked closely with former broadcaster Professor Emerita Lis Howell to learn about what makes a story newsworthy.

She taught them to look for news that is true, timely and interesting. The children interviewed their teachers, parents and fellow students to come up with their script.

At City in March, the broadcast journalism tech team helped mic up the children and set up the autocue for the newsreaders.

Prof Emerita Lis Howell stands in City's studio broadcast studio, which has a green screen, behind the camera. To her right is a screen which shows primary school two students sitting at a desk with a London skyline like they're on TV news. — Prof Emerita Lis Howell and two primary school children record a news segment at City's TV news studio

Children from the St John’s Highbury Vale school reported on the cost-of-living crisis, schools sports, a new teacher starting, and the unseasonably rainy weather in March.

They discussed how the school took part in Numbers Day to fundraise for the UK children’s charity NSPCC as well as what fellow students dressed up as for World Book Day – the Gruffalo and the Gingerbread Man.

Rebecca Powder, Year 6 Teacher at St John’s Highbury Vale, said:

The children’s favourite part of the News Club is creating their own scripts. Every child got a chance to have a go.
I hope the children will gain confidence after participating in the News Club– having the confidence to be in front of a camera is quite a big thing!
On the way to campus, the children were very excited about what they could study here at City, University of London and how they could get to university.

The journalism tech team will be working hard across the next few weeks to produce and deliver the news segments to each of the six participating schools.

The News Club was set up by Professor Howell and University’s Widening Participation and Outreach Team in 2019 to give back and provide opportunities to City’s local community. In the years since, it has grown to include six local schools.

A pupil helps another put on a microphone at City's broadcast studio — Islington schoolchildren help each other put their mics on to film a news segment at City's TV studio.

Schools taking part this year were the St Mary Magdalene’s Academy, St Jude and St Paul’s Primary School, St John’s Upper Holloway, St Andrew’s Barnsbury, St Mary’s Islington and St John’s Highbury Vale.

Professor Howell is an experienced and award-winning former broadcaster, having held the roles of Managing Editor at Sky News and having held the role of an ITV regional Head of News.

At City, Professor Howell continues to contribute to the field of journalism through her Expert Women project, which has contributed to a 40% rise of women experts being featured in major UK news programmes.

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