School Report

BBC News reporter Sarah Ransome spent the day with Year 8 pupils at Coombeshead College, Newton Abbot as part of the BBC School Report scheme.

The Visit Of Sarah Ransom

By Jake

"Sarah explained how things work at the BBC and what's involved in a day's work.

Sarah said that the most uninteresting interview she had ever had was with Britain's fattest dog! She was hoping it would bark, but it didn't bark, so she had to speak to the pet owner instead.

I asked if she still got excited when she heard herself on the radio? She found that question hard to answer, but eventually she said yes.

Sarah Ransome explains her job

Her job involves phoning people, travelling to exciting places and interviewing all sorts of people. Sarah has to book lots of rooms and work to a very tight schedule.

The job has its exciting moments, like when she nearly got trapped on a beach in the middle of a live interview.

She had forgotten to check the tide times! Luckily she managed to save herself and the equipment.

All the students really enjoyed the day, it was good fun and interesting. Thank-you Sarah!"

Toby added: "Today I interviewed Sarah Ransome. She is a reporter for the BBC, and she is stationed in Plymouth but travels all round the South West.

In the first part of the day we talked about news and, working in pairs, chose stories from all the newspapers.

Mine and Tom's story was about the Golden Globe Awards but others chose stories on Big Brother and one pair choose a story on a suicide bombers' suicide note.

Once every pair had a story we discussed how we would find out if it was true and who we contact to find out more. After about an hour of this we looked at some reports Sarah had done.

All that was left to do was interview Sarah, so in are pairs we wrote down no more than ten questions and each took it in turns in our pairs to interview her. It was great fun."

The highs & lows of reporting explained

Summer wrote: "I thought the day went really well and we learned lots of things about interviewing people.

We saw all the equipment that Sarah carries around with her every day, including a big satellite and a mixer which she uses to send recordings and interviews to the main BBC news studio in London.

The best part of the day was asking Sarah our questions and finding out about experiences she has had."

Richard and Robert said they asked her questions about her job with the BBC.

"She said she had worked in many radio stations and she usually likes to work in the field since she likes being out and about.

She said her favourite part of the job was meeting new people, going places and investigating news stories."

Olivia said: "I thought the day went really well and I learned quite a lot about the news and how much preparation goes in to giving a live radio broadcast.

Then we got to interview Sarah and ask her any questions about her job and what she did in the past which was really interesting. Some of the answers were amazing.

We also found out all the steps we'd have to take if we wanted to write a story about something that was big news. We would have to make sure that all the facts were true. We would have to make a lot of phone calls!"

Tom said Sarah gave students a taste of the life of a BBC news reporter. "She explained how shows such as Newsround were put together and gave them an idea of the pace you need to work at to produce a programme like that.

We then each planned a practical way how to report and verify a few of that day's big stories including Jade Goody's racist comments on Big Brother and the British dominated Golden Globes awards.

Sarah gave us a few examples of situations she has experienced from the good, reporting on an exciting alligator sighting in Cornwall, to the bad, spending all day
waiting on a Cornish cliff top waiting for some remains to wash up whilst being forced back by the strong wind and lashing rain, and the ugly, losing her voice at the exact moment Ellen McArthur returned from her round the world trip, when she was first on the scene!

She finished off the day by giving as some valuable advice: "The best way to achieve success as a news reporter is to try reporting at every opportunity you get."