Beginning.

Hello all, 

Welcome to my new sparkly blog. 

Let me introduce myself: 

"My name is Hayley Johnston, a graduate (2013) of a Foundation Degree in Journalism, residing in the lovely city of Norwich and living with my fabulous fiancé. 

I currently work 20 hours a week at Primark (fun) and I am heavily involved in looking for a job with more hours (this is what my life revolves around at the mo). In my spare time I read, do puzzles, make crafts, socialize with my crazy friends and spend time with my wonderful family and mad pet dog Toby. 

I am what you would call 'unique'. I have 82 rubber ducks that live with me and my partner, I am obsessed with Friends and Harry Potter, my sense of fashion doesn't exist and I wear vintage clothing most of the time. I am silly and like to laugh at things no-one else would (besides my nearest and dearest).  

My passions are: writing, travelling, crafts, ducks, film, music, fashion, celebrities, culture and art. That's me in a nutshell."

Let me tell you my journalism journey so far:

"I completed a Foundation Degree in Journalism where I studied radio, print, broadcast and investigative news. This course was only 2 years, I have no BA and never did a dissertation. I felt that a BA was not what most employers look for in journalism; it was NCTJs. I set out to complete those (although not really knowing what I had to take). My course was very limited with only 9 people on it so I have my Law NCTJ and my Politics NCTJ, that is all. 

Still under the impression of not wanting a BA and not wanting to do 10,000 more words, I did not choose to do a top-up degree. Instead my priority was to work full time as my student loans had come to an end and my partner and I were still living together (but he was on a 3 year degree and therefore fine). 

For the past year I have worked a lot and paid my own way in our flat, and that has been my focus because it had to be. I should have been writing stories that entire time, or even blogging, but (guiltily) my mind was not in it because of my work hours. 

I was applying for lots of jobs, some in journalism, and getting nowhere in anything. Then recently I had an interview for the Eastern Daily Press (Archant) as a Junior Reporter (wow). The job said NCTJs desirable but training would be given - I missed out on the job because of not having all NCTJs." 

This brought me back down to earth with a bump, I am by no means happy working full time at primark and failing at applying for other jobs but I had unintentionally put journalism on the back burner until this job came up, and so when I was unsuccessful because of my lack of qualifications - it got my mind racing. 

I need the rest of my NCTJs, and to be quite frank a BA would be preferable. The standard course the NCTJ offer to get the rest (but paying for all) is near £600. And a top-up now would mean (I assume) paying my own way with out being eligible for one year of student loans. 

I honestly do not know what I am going to do, I need to find a place that lets me sit the NCTJ exams singly and do them that way (and sacrifice not having a BA). BUT this is all for working in newspapers and I sat there and honestly thought "what am I interested in?" - magazines. 

Based on what I am interested in (see above) I thought, you know what I would love to work for Look magazine, or Closer, or Kerrang! or even any craft magazine, hell I'd love that! 

I googled magazine journalism and found this - https://nationalcareersservice.direct.gov.uk/advice/planning/jobprofiles/Pages/magazinejournalist.aspx 

So my plan of action right now:

- still find that other job with more hours to afford living with my partner still
- email magazines like crazy
- still pursue getting the rest of my NCTJs 
- write stories about everything and anything (tailor them to some magazines)
- put those stories on a blog in blog format and send that out to people 

So there, that is why this blog now exists, and will serve the above^ purpose. 

Ciao.