ROBOT tutors, televised lectures and voice recording pens – welcome to the University of the future!
Beth Cust, 20, from Hove Edge, Brighouse, created this award-winning vision in a competition to compile a video podcast on the theme: ‘What will it be like to be a university student in 2020?’
Beth attended Greenhead College in Huddersfield and is now in the first-year of a BA Interactive Arts Degree at Manchester Metropolitan University.
She said: “It was my tutor who told me about the podcast competition and I decided to give it a go.
“One of the first challenges was how to get the message across in just 60 seconds, so I tried to make my entry as visual as possible.
“I managed to rope in a friend to help and together we set up five stop points across the university, where we set up cameras and asked students to write on boards what they thought university life would be like in the future.”
Representatives from organisations such as Apple Computers, the BBC, Manchester Digital Development Agency and Manchester Metropolitan University Business School judged the podcasts on their creativity, originality, entertainment value and understanding of the concept.
Beth came third in the competition and won an Apple Macbook as her prize.
She added: “I was so excited to hear I’d come third and it’s great to have a Macbook.
“My Interactive Arts degree allows me to do a lot of experimental work with film and I see myself as a video/animation artist.
“After I graduate I’d love to get into directing music videos.”
Other entries ranged from a 2-D animated vision of an environmentally-friendly campus to a desolate, frightening land where students trudged towards a centre of knowledge and plugged into a brighter world.
The winner of the competition was awarded a £5,000 prize, with second place £1500, and fourth and fifth receiving an iPod Nano.
The top-five podcasts have been posted on Youtube and are also available on the University’s Business School Facebook page and from iTunes.
