Victoria Uni & Radio New Zealand Launch Creative

Radio New Zealand and Victoria University have announced a new joint venture which will see the public broadcaster involved in a partnership with Professor Bill Manhire's Creative Writing Programme.

A new course, Creative Writing in the Marketplace, scheduled to start in July, will have a strong practical orientation and includes an overview of the ways in which literary imagination is incorporated into the world of broadcasting.

Students will have the opportunity in one of the course options to work alongside experienced broadcasters and programmers to complete special projects related to writing and production for radio.

Radio New Zealand Programme Development Manager, Elizabeth Alley, sees the initiative as an opportunity to encourage new writing talent with direct application to broadcasting.

" As public broadcasters, we have a continuing responsibility to identify the talent of the future, and to revitalise our own programming with new skills and ideas" she said. " We are pleased to be able to provide the means to develop these skills in conjunction with Victoria University and to participate in the identification and training of future talent. We believe the interaction between students and staff will provide a fertile breeding ground for new ideas and programmes".

Director of Victoria University's Creative Writing Programme, Bill Manhire, believes the groundbreaking partnership with Radio New Zealand is particularly exciting. " Radio is a very creative and flexible medium, offering an audience on a scale writers can only dream of. Radio New Zealand has enormous in house talent and expertise - so students taking the radio option in the course are particularly fortunate".

Two other course options being launched include designing and staging a literary event and editing a literary magazine (print or web-based).

Creative Writing In The Marketplace is scheduled to begin in the second Victioria University trimester, commencing on 16 July. Applications for the course close on 1 May.

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