Griffith College offers a wide variety of postgraduate and professional courses at its campuses in Dublin and Cork

Based on the southside of Dublin — near the city centre — Griffith College Dublin (GCD) offers a variety of postgraduate and professional courses, ranging from media communications to international business management.

The Higher Education and Training Awards Council (HETAC) higher diploma in journalism is a one-year full-time or 18-month part-time course. It concentrates on giving practical and academic media-based training geared towards eventual employment for graduates as journalists, radio researchers, presenters, producers, technical writers and other media-related positions.

The National Union of Journalists’ (NUJ) recognition of the course entitles full-time students to a one-year NUJ card. Students on this programme regularly win awards in the Student Media Awards and graduates are currently working for the Sunday Independent, the Irish Independent, the Evening Herald, Today FM, Newstalk 106FM and RTÉ. The programme will be offered at the Cork campus from September.

The HETAC higher diploma in computing bridges the gap between non-computing disciplines and computing science. Students who obtain second-class honours in this programme are eligible to be considered for GCD’s MSc programme. This gives a competency and understanding of academic and industrial computing research.

“Successful MSc students will have the ability to research and master technical subjects within the cutting edge of technological advancements,” says Tony Mullins, course director. The Faculty of Computing is also in the process of developing postgraduate programmes in multimedia.

The Graduate Business School is building on GCD’s established reputation for a dynamic teaching environment and student success in business and finance. Programmes range from a postgraduate certificate to a master’s degree in international business management.

The Professional Law School at Griffith College runs a part-time intensive preparatory course for part one of the Law Society’s Final Examinations (FE1). Griffith College students won six out of nine FE1 prizes in 2003 and again in 2004.

The Griffith College FE1 programme now runs in Limerick, Cork and Galway. The Professional Law School also offers courses for legal executives and preparatory courses for the New York Bar, the Honourable Society of King’s Inns’ entrance examinations and the Qualified Lawyers Transfer Test.

Applications will be accepted until the end of August. Information is available from the Postgraduate Admissions Office on 01 4150400 or at www.gcd.ie