BBC Studios
On June 22nd, our class learned that the The BBC stands for the British Broadcasting Corporation. It is located at Broadcasting House, London and is the world’s largest and oldest broadcasting service to date. The BBC has over 20,000 employees that include part-time, contract and flexible staff. The BBC was founded 94 years ago by John Reith. Its services include broadcasting, radio and online with a revenue of over 5 billion pounds. The BBC reaches audiences worldwide by charging all British households, companies and organizations using equipment to receive or record live television broadcasts. This is done by the British Government to fund BBC’s radio, TV, and online services.
BBC has been up and running at MediaCityUK since 2011, producing thousands of hours of content for TV, radio and online. Over 3,000 employees work at 26 departments including BBC Children’s, BBC Learning, BBC Radio 5 live, BBC Sport, BBC Radio Manchester and BBC Breakfast as well as Religion and Ethics, BBC Philharmonic and many more. The Philharmonic is a broadcasting orchestra based in Salford. It performs at Manchester’s Bridgewater Hall, tours the North of England, and welcomes audiences in its recording studio at MediaCityUK. The room doesn’t use any electronics but instead uses certain materials on the walls to make each song sound the way it should. A tour guide mentioned “Nothing is done by accident in the Philharmonic room.” Every little detail is extremely thought out and is changed for every song the orchestra plays. Abbey wrote, “The room was designed by an acoustician, ensuring the sounds fulfill their full potential. The room was enriched with shades of purple for a calming sense.”
We got to see where BBC Breakfast does their morning show and how stressful their mornings are. Our group got to see the big red couch and all the cameras used every morning during the show. We also got a glimpse of how the meteorologists do the weather. Our class got to pretend to be meteorologists in front of the cameras and take pictures. Afterwards, we headed to the BBC Sports broadcasting room and got to see the table where reporters and athletes talk about sports. When the tour was done, our class got the chance to report the news and do the weather as if we were really on air.
