Studying from China

15 October 2021

Let’s find out more with a fellow student Juan Cheng from China. She is a media student, currently living in Shanghai, the biggest city in China and third in the world, based on population. The world knows China as the ‘Sleeping Giant.’ That nickname came from the former French military leader and emperor Napoleon. Well, I guess his prediction was correct, as China is waking up towards its economic power. China has become an emerging powerhouse economically, but it is thriving in the media industry too. TikTok launched in 2016 in China. Now it has over 2 billion downloads and over 600 million users monthly. So, why does a student from Shanghai wants to come to Solent and do Media Production?

This is where she works very closely with the videographer, ensuring she is getting the vision her client wants to see.

She replies, “I like videography and something about social media. That is why I choose media production.” She picked Solent because she believes what Solent can give her would be “pretty nice” to have. I completely understand what she means because I’m a Solent student, too. Many things we do here are building towards our career. Especially, having at least 100 hours of work experience and the majority of your work is practical. You get to experience different forms of media in your first year. In your final year, you get to do a more specific final major project that would be an excellent opportunity for you to showcase your future employee. That could be a video or online, especially if you’re a student like Juan. Right now, she is currently producing a fiction drama for her video FMP.

She is now discussing with the actress and videographer where they're at in the script.

The world we live in is not so perfect, so I asked her, “what are the pros and cons of doing an online course with Solent from China?” Juan responds, “first of all, I would like to travel to the UK and have one year of study there, but it got postponed due to Covid-19. However, I gradually became aware that study in China and doing an online course probably is the best choice for me. Since I already got a job that related to the industry.” Positively, media is a global industry. She can do university simultaneously with work, despite how she is far away from the UK.

Now the crew is giving each other feedback on what went well and what they can improve.

Therefore, what is Juan looking forward to the most after graduation and the post-Covid-19 era? Well, she wants to keep working and contributing to her current job. When the pandemic is over, Juan wants to come to England and give Solent University a visit when it is safe to travel, of course. Then, I asked Juan what project is she working on in China at the moment? Right now, she is currently taking a role as a director assistant with her local media company. However, she is “doing more than that.” Her role at the company involves pre-production, like coming up with concept ideas and getting involved with the production.

Currently, she's involved with four projects:

She just completed her script and pre-production part. Involve interviewing actress, searching for locations, and constantly communicate with the client. They’re about to move onto a production process of shooting after both parties have signed the contract.
She is also taking the director assistant’s role on a Honda car race project, which is being held once per week in ten cities until July.
Also, she finishes a commercial script for a red tea and Pu’er tea. However, due to her tight schedule with the Honda race project, she doesn’t have the time to participate in the production process.
She is also working on smaller projects too like TikTok activities videos.

This is her already moving on to her next project.

In her conclusion, “this year the business is pretty good for us. So, we constantly have a project to do, no matter big or small.” She gets to work with a variety of people in the creative industry. Surprisingly, you might think homework sounds like a high-school thing. Her boss gives her and her colleagues homework, or in the professional world, we call this Career and Professional Development (CPD). Currently, she is researching film and tech. Okay, doing some homework may sound a little bit of a stretch, and it sounds more professional if you use the word research. But if you want to up your game, especially in this competitive era, you have to take an extra step even in this time of crisis. As a result, Juan has shown us that she didn’t let the pandemic be an obstacle to reaching her dream. Therefore, you shouldn’t let it stop yours too.

Written, Edited, and Published by Krisana Polyotha

BA(Hons) Media Production

Solent Media