Journalism students at Up To Speed’s NCTJ Fast Track course in Digital Journalism have been briefed on a new site this morning, which will enhance their learning experience.

The BBC College of Journalism, which was created in the wake of the Hutton Inquiry four years ago, is due to go public today giving students access to master classes in reporting and interviewing by the BBC’s most high profile reporters including John Simpson and John Humphrys.

Up To Speed’s Course Director Tom Hill, a former BBC journalist, has seen parts of the site during meetings with the Director of the College of Journalism Vin Ray.

“We will be able to hear BBC journalists explaining key concepts in journalism,” said Tom. “For instance, Evan Davis who presents Today on BBC Radio 4 and Dragon’s Den on BBC TV, has taken the time to make a film explaining the importance of impartiality, one of the keystones of broadcast journalism.”

BBC Reporter Evan Davis Advises on Impartiality

The site, which is used as a virtual learning environment by the BBC’s 7,000 journalists, will also help students on Up To Speed’s Fast-Track in Digital Journalism to prepare for exams in Media Law, Public Affairs and News Writing.

It may sound obvious, but if you want to become a journalist it really does help if you love words. Reading. Writing. That kind of thing.

And so it’s perhaps not surprising that in Up To Speed’s look at the undergraduate careers of 75 leading journalists, English came out on top. Twenty people on the list read English at university.

Among the newsreaders Natasha Kaplinsky at Five and Samira Ahmed  at Channel 4 News were at Oxford as was the Daily Mail columnist Melanie Phillips. ITV’s Julie Etchingham, Newsnight presenter Emily Maitlis and BBC Sport presenter Clare Balding were at Cambridge. Mary Nightingale, also at ITV, graduated from Royal Holloway, London.

English was also the subject of choice for many of the male faces on television. Jeremy Paxman, Andrew Marr, Sir David Frost, John Simpson and Edward Stourton all read English at Cambridge. Ian Hislop and the Channel 4 News reporter and presenter Alex Thomson both went to Oxford as did Evening Standard editor Geordie Greg whose first job on a south London weekly paper allowed him to list his credentials as Eton, Oxford and Deptford. Panorama presenter Jeremy Vine has an English degree from Durham, while Adrian Chiles went to Westfield College, London and Gavin Esler studied English and American Literature at Kent. The film reviewer Mark Lawson read English at University College, London.

However, the key to success for many of these people was the work they were doing when they weren’t studying English. Julie Etchingham combined her degree with a show on BBC Radio Cambridge and Jeremy Vine had an overnight music show on Metro Radio in Newcastle.

During their time at Cambridge, David Frost and John Simpson were both editors of Granta while Jeremy Paxman edited Varsity. Edward Stourton edited another student magazine called Rampage before joining ITN as a trainee. Clare Balding was President of the Cambridge Union.

At Oxford, Samira Ahmed was editor of Isis, while Ian Hislop went his own way with a college paper called Breaking Wind. He landed his job with Private Eye after interviewing his predecessor Richard Ingrams.

English may have come out on top in our survey, but hot on its heels was another subject, or cluster of subjects – politics, philosophy and economics. We’ll have more on that tomorrow.