London 2012

Sport journalism students to report on Olympics

Published 10 July 2012

Three Sport Journalism students will celebrate graduation by being in the thick of it at the Olympics, reporting on the Games and the Paralympics for the organisers, LOCOG.

Sunni Upal and Jon Vale, who will graduate in July, have been hired to supply news stories and interviews for the Olympic and Paralympic news service during the sporting fiesta. Another student Giuseppe Muro has a role with LOCOG as beach volleyball correspondent.

Sunni Upal, Chad Nugent, Tommy Curran and Jon Vale.

“It feels great to get this position working with LOCOG and I am really excited for the summer,” says Sunni. “It makes all the hard work I have put in at university worth it. To be able to work on the biggest sporting event our country has ever seen is a fantastic feeling.

“As far as the actual job goes, the work will not be particularly stimulating and will involve sitting at the international press centre in the village and writing up press conferences. Even so, to be right in the thick of the action is amazing.

“Getting this position was only made possible by working hard at university and to be recognised by Rob Steen as having the potential to fill this role. Having been put forward, it was important I showed a broad range of skills that I have built up at university, the most important of which being shorthand.”

Securing the job also presents the students with a prickly dilemma – graduation day falls on the eve of the Olympics, by which time they’ll be full steam ahead in their new roles. Such is the price of success.