The whole course gave me a great foundation for a future role in PR and the communications sector, a foundation I am building on every day

Currently I hold the position of Research and Media Relations Officer at Evergreen PR, a specialist communications consultancy for the health sector.

At Evergreen, our mission is to help leading health institutions, charities and business transform health by working with them to achieve their priority goals. As you can tell by the name, my role revolves around two areas: research and the media. I work with colleagues on research projects that form the backbone of our work with clients – this can range from collecting statistics on NHS services and analysing academic studies to interviewing people on their experience of a health condition.

We use this research to create strategic communication campaigns for our clients and it informs activities like crafting reports and press releases, structuring events and conferences and developing animations and graphic designs. Along with research, media relations is a big part of my role – I am frequently writing news release and engaging with journalists about our campaigns, in order to secure clients media coverage in online, broadcast and print platforms.

I am incredibly interested in healthcare as a sector and at Evergreen I have been able to work on some great, worthwhile projects with some amazing colleagues. It’s been a privilege to work with
brilliant organisations such as the Royal College of General Practitioners, the Personalised Care Institute, Quorn and Tinnitus UK.

In terms of challenges, like many other places of work, it can be fast paced, with deadlines to meet and the need to juggle various projects – but it keeps things interesting and certainly never boring!

MA IPPC helped me in various ways! The modules on creating communication campaigns and public relations was a great for building skills on how to effectively plan and deliver impactful campaigns. The coursework that resulted from the module gave me two two excellent pieces of projects to put on my CV – which impressed my would be employer when I networked with him for the first time. Gaining an insight from lectures into the media, many of them former journalists or PR professionals themselves, offered a very valuable foundation for navigating the media landscape when I graduated and found myself working in public relations. Beyond the campaigning and PR modules, the courses on political communication, conflict, crisis and communications, and others, were not only fascinating, but helped build researching and writing skills that I use every day.

The course trip to London to tour the HQ of Amnesty International, Houses of Parliament, followed by Q&A session with the journalists Emily Maitlis and Laura Kuenssberg was a particular highlight. Another highlight was the opportunity to meet some really interesting and lovely people from all over the world, which was an experience I am really grateful for.

I would say the whole course gave me a great foundation for a future role in PR and the communications sector, a foundation I am building on every day.