By Aneela Aziz

There were two parts to the Kerrang experience which was organsied by Envision. The first day we all got together as a group and got to know each other and did group activities such as playing games. Then we thought about interview techniques and had to interview someone in the room, we had to show the rest of the group what we have done and the group would comment on the negative and positive aspects of our interview. The idea of this was for the preparation before going to Kerrang radio station and actually interviewing for real depending if you were the reporter or presenter.

I really enjoyed my first part of the Kerrang radio experience as I met new people who I was working with and also developed my knowledge and understanding on how an interview should be and the aspects or attributes to presenting a good interview. The second part of the first day we got into groups, for example the advertising group and the reporter group, and we would decide what our podcast will be about.

The main theme and idea of the two day experience was to present a positive image of the youth of today and what youths bring to society and the place we live in. I was in the reporters group and we decided what we will have on the day and what will be suitable to put in out podcasts. To finish off we watched some podcasts from young people who are part of Envision and brought our opinions about what we liked about their podcast, what we didn’t like and how it could be improved. This helped me think about how we can create a podcast that would be good and interesting for our audience of both young and older people.

On the second day of the Kerrang experience we went to Kerrang radio which was amazing. I felt like I was a professional there. At the beginning of the day we were introduced by the person who works at Kerrang and deals with the creative side of the station. He gave us an introduction on Kerrang station and an outline of the station itself. He also spoke to us about what makes a good podcast and we also had a tour of the building, meeting different people like the reporters and the presenters there.

Then we were put into our groups. There were groups of reporters, the presenters, the advertising team, creative writers and researchers. I was the program director, I had to take control of the input for the podcast and I worked along with the deputy program director. I really enjoyed my role as I took control of what our podcast will be about and went to each group making sure everything was running smoothly and I helped each team out with ideas. I also had to create the structure of the podcast and the groups helped me with this and we also had to pick songs which as a group we decided what songs should be put in the podcasts.

Then when everyone completed their task they rehearsed what they were going to say on the podcast and then it was recorded on the radio station. I made sure that the people were comfortable and felt confident in the process of recoding themselves and would make comments on what could be improved and what I liked about it. Although I was the program director I wanted to have my voice heard on the station so I took part in the advertising and was the female actor for one of our advertisements about “truth about youth” which was really good and enjoyed doing this.      

I had an amazing experience meeting different types of people from Envision and the Kerrang team and I really got on well with everyone. We all enjoyed ourselves as it was one day opportunity to be at Kerrang so I put my hard work and effort into it and tried my best throughout the process. In addition to working hard and creating a podcast we also met the singer/song writer James Morrison, which was great and got our pictures taken with him and an autograph. We were lucky to be at Kerrang at the time James Morrison was there. I cannot wait to listen to the whole of the podcast in two weeks time; I’m so excited about it!

My experience at Kerrang made me think about working hard and getting my dream job as a journalist and to meet different types of famous people as I really enjoyed my role and experience and Kerrang. I know what I want to be in the future and cannot wait to have the opportunity to be a professional journalist and I am really grateful for the opportunity for Envision to organize an experience like this and hopefully will be able to have more chances like this in the near future.