Edith Cowan University

Currently studying towards my bachelor of education I find myself both here at ECU Mount Lawley and Joondalup.
Mount lawley may not be as new joondalup campus with their huge pond and brightly coloured modern furniture, however offers such warmth and comfort in the close community that is shared at this campus. Friendly faces, ample coffee stops, constant performances around you (shared campus with waapa) and murals of student art work projected at you wherever you are! Let’s not forget the well accredited and acknowledged tutors and lecturers, because uni is still about learning right haha
All in all I always look forward to attending the hands on, practical classes here at ecu mount lawley — their facilities and staff members are incredible!
And may I add café 10 is the place to be for the smoothest coffee, I even get my coffee fix here when I don’t have uni!

So I picked and attended Edith Cowan University because the degree it offered was the most closely aligned with my interests and career objectives. But aside from that I found it to be a kick-​ass University. ECU places a lot of importance on employing tutors and lecturers with long-​term exceptional experience in the industries they are educating you on. I completed a Bachelor of Communications with a double Major in Advertising and Journalism and enjoyed every minute of it (ok except for the exams, I didn’t enjoy them).
I also loved that the university wasn’t too big, it had an awesome close-​knit vibe, which I think still lives on in the Alumni and their relationship with each other to this day.

I’ve studied both at the general uni here (in the Literature and Theatre schools) and WAAPA and both experiences were pretty good.
I’m not sure if it’s still offered, but ECU’s general Drama Studies unit was a great introduction for me to both the theory and practice of theatre work; I’m not sure that it was as effective for everybody else in the course, as it felt a little like a a holding pond for people who eventually wanted to do a degree at WAAPA. I’m glad I did a year of this study, focusing intensely on plays as works of literature and interrogating their meanings and construction, as it really informed my approach to creating performance. I’m not sure that if I had continued on with studying my degree that I would have come out with the skills needed to be where I am now, but it was a very helpful year! I took a couple of creative writing units during that year too, which helped me enormously in developing my creativity.
There’s a long story behind why I spent the third year of my main degree at WAAPA that I won’t bore you with, but for the most part I really enjoyed my time there; I studied a course there that has now transferred over to SOCA (the contemporary art school). The facilities and theatres are all fantastic, though the politics of which venue you get to use depending on which course you are in have a definite effect on things. The quality of education and production here is very high and I would recommend it to people. The SOCA course comes highly recommended if you want to create your own work in theatre, live art or any other kind of performance, but I would strongly advise against it if you just want to work as a realistic actor as you will be frustrated in it. I personally found it to be exactly the completely immersive education in devising performance that I was after, though some of the teachers were better than others.

ECU, it is looking pretty cool. Its better looking than Curtin– Curtin the concrete jungle. When I studied at Curtin, I use to day dream about throwing large tins of paint from the roof of the buildings, needless to say I didn’t graduate with distinctions.
Back to ECU, it is renowned for their preforming arts expertise and actually has good credibility around the world, I remember enquiring about a film and television course when I was living in London and they just said to me «go back home– ECU is the best for film and television» so there you have it, ECU are the best or London just wanted to get rid of me.

When I began studying at this institution, it was known as the Western Australian College of Advanced Education, or WACAE for short. Yes, it did rhyme with ‘wacky’ and, having completed a major in Media Studies with a minor in Psychology, I kind of went a little loopy myself.
The course units were stimulating in terms of content (this is where I first learnt the term postmodernism, donchaknow) but just not challenging enough. My fault, I suppose, for earning a rather high aggregate in high school, and opting, instead of medicine or law, for a degree that was on par with teaching on an admissions level. Back in the early Nineties.
Things have changed, and now if you want to study Media — correction: Communications — you need some ridiculously higher entry score, and of course, ECU has needed to keep up with technological advances.
I took a tour here recently and noted all the analogue editing suites were of course taken over by digital gadgetry. The production studios were still their small, cosy, old selves. And I even spotted some of my ol’ lecturers’ names still on the same office doors.
I considered re-​enrolling here to partake in a WAAPA course in broadcasting, but industry associates recommended other places with far better range in hardware and software and less focus on whitewash politics. And I’m not just telling you this because the Dean at ECU neglected to invite me to guest-​speak after graduation, while UWA, Murdoch and Curtin kept the invitations coming…