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School of English and Drama

Graduate Attributes and Careers

Drama at Queen Mary has an excellent record for graduate employment, with 75% of our graduates being in graduate-level employment after six months (Guardian 2013).

Studying Drama with us will give you a range of key graduate attributes that will serve you in good stead after you graduate. As a Drama student at Queen Mary, you will also have many opportunities to gain useful work experience and specific careers advice.

Graduate Attributes

Studying Drama with us will give you rigorous analytical and communication skills and the ability to work independently and collaboratively. These qualities make our Drama graduates sought after in the workplace. 

Whatever career you choose, by the end of your degree you can expect to have developed these important graduate attributes:

  • communication skills, by expressing yourself in performance and in writing
  • presentation skills, by performing your work and giving class presentations
  • team-working skills, by participating with fellow-students in seminars, group research presentations and performances
  • reading skills, by using a range of approaches to tackle different kinds of texts
  • analytical abilities, by interpreting and theorising about the meanings of texts and performances
  • writing abilities, by preparing a range of assignments (including research-based essays, reports, performance logbooks, and journals)
  • research skills, by locating, sifting, and interpreting a range of sources (from printed books and journals to archival material to electronic resources)
  • time management skills and the ability to work under pressure, by organising and fulfilling diverse assessments and commitments
  • management and leadership skills, by planning the staging of your practical work
  • financial knowledge, by learning about how theatre is funded
  • technical skills, by learning about the scenographic and staging elements that contribute to creating successful performances

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Work Experience

Outside of your studies, you will also have many opportunities to gain useful work experience to further enhance your skill set.

While studying with us, students have worked on placements with a wide variety of arts organisations, including People’s Palace Projects, Phakama, and Air Supply. These placements provide students with practical experience of managing and staging performances, while they also familiarise students with London’s creative sector and allow them to establish useful connections.

There are many other creative outlets at Queen Mary for you to gain work experience. These include:

There are in addition over 1200 on-campus jobs (ranging from Library Assistant to School Mentor), and many further opportunities for work experience throughout London’s East End. Our Careers Service can help you find the perfect opportunity through their various schemes, including QProjects (working with charities and arts organisations), QM Temps, and QMSU Provide.

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Careers Events

Alongside these opportunities to gain work experience, you will also have access to workshops and events run by Queen Mary’s Careers Service on topics such as job hunting and writing a CV. The Careers Service also offers specific events for Drama students, including a recent series of 'Career Conversations' with alumni now in journalism, creative writing, festival management, PR, marketing, and theatre.

Drama regularly invites artists and arts professionals to share their expertise with our students, and a number of our graduates now work with practitioners and companies that they first encountered while studying Drama. We have also recently run a successful series of ‘Livelihood Lunches’ seminars which offered practical tips and advice to help students forge a career in the cultural sector.

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QProjects

Students in the Department have benefitted greatly from Queen Mary's award-winning QProjects endeavour. QProjects offers exciting work experience opportunities in a range of local charities, and has placed many of our current students in roles designed to allow them to gain a range of transferable skills and potentially some experience working in a career area that interests them.

I'm off to Royal Central School of Speech and Drama to do and MA in Writing for Stage and Broadcast Media, which I'm really looking forward to! Thank you so much for the work with QProjects as that is what got me into Soho Theatre for work experience and I think that really strengthened my application for the MA. I'm also in touch with a lot of people at Soho and I often go and see their new work, so it's been great for friends and my pool of contacts!
2013 English and Drama graduate
QProjects was a great chance for me to develop professional skills that have relevance in any job. In that respect, it doesn’t necessarily matter if a student’s Project has a direct link to where they end up after they graduate. It’s the opportunity to actually go out there and do some work, achieve goals and learn how to be a professional that I think is most useful about the scheme.
2012 English and Drama graduate
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