With our industry constantly evolving and, for the moment due to the pandemic, in a state of flux, I thought now might be the best time to returning to University and take advantage of this time to further myself and my skills. I’ve always wanted to do my masters and for myself, the MA in Arts, Festival and Cultural Management is the perfect choice.

This first semester, starting in January 2021, has mainly focused on ideas of planning and marketing of cultural projects as well as finance and fundraising. This has really help me get to grips with the theory and methods of best practice, universal to the arts and culture, to best run projects and organisations. In addition, it has helped contextualise my knowledge with case studies and examples which have been incredibly beneficial to my work.

Additionally, throughout the year, we have had a number of talks and discussions focused on Arts Management in Practice from industry professionals who have been amazing to talk to and question along with first hand internships and work experience which has been beneficial to my wider understanding of arts management.

My final project was a dissertation focusing on Best Practice within film exhibition in a post-covid landscape. I have now completed this course and gained my MA with Merit in September 2022.

At QMU, I undertook a number of areas of study including: