Gareth Davies

He has been reflecting on his journey into university and on finding his passion on a trip to the Cairngorms.

“In my first year I really struggled to write in English,” said Gareth, who grew up in Wales, speaking the Welsh language. “My lecturer called me into his office to speak about it. I’d never written an essay in English before and I didn’t actually speak English until I was 7 or 8.”

It’s hard to imagine that one of the nation’s leading journalists would have ever struggled with writing, but coming to an English university meant a new set of challenges for Gareth.

He said: “My essays were just written as if I was talking to someone. I’d start a sentence with ‘To be honest’, I’d write ‘like’ in the middle of a sentence, and that kind of thing.”

Gareth accessed services at the University aimed at helping students become accustomed to a new way of working.

“I got extra time, and I got a couple of classes that other students with English as a second language would have gotten,” he said. “It was just really basic stuff like how to structure an essay in the English language, which is something I’d never done in school because it was a Welsh medium school.”

Gareth chose a joint honours course- Geography and Sports Coaching - which he said helped him figure out what he wanted to do with his life.

He said: “I’d chosen geography because I was good at it in school, and I fancied myself as a coach so I’d gone along the sports path too.”

After graduating, Gareth went into teaching but reflecting on his time at the University of Worcester, he said he can trace his passion for journalism back to a specific moment.

He said: “We went on a geography field trip to the Cairngorms, where they were all about conservation, but they’d recently started inviting people out to walk on a part of their land for a certain price. We were speaking to someone from the National Park about it and we asked about conservation, but was it just for the right price that they let people walk through it?”

He added: “That was my first real sense of holding anyone to account and I walked out of that room feeling a sense of accomplishment. I’d asked tough questions and that’s where it started.”

After Worcester Gareth went to Brighton to do a course with the National Council for the Training of Journalists before getting a job on the Brighton Argus, the local paper.

“I was a Reporter, then a Senior Reporter, then Education Editor, and from there I went to the Mail Online as a Foreign and US Reporter,” he said.

Gareth then moved to the Telegraph where he was a Digital News Producer before he got a promotion to Breaking News Editor, then Acting Editor, and now Editor of the website.

Many journalists have back-stories where they knew exactly what they wanted to do from a very early age, but it wasn’t quite like that for Gareth.

“I tripped into news journalism, really,” he said. “It wasn’t something I ever wanted to do, but as soon as I got into it I just caught the bug and it’s something I’ve really enjoyed.”

He continued: “I love holding powerful people to account. It’s something I’ve always enjoyed, when you see someone senior somewhere wriggling and getting squirmy and panicked when they’ve done something wrong. That always gives you a sense of satisfaction and it was at Worcester where I had that first experience.”

Like Gareth with his career in journalism, you’ll find some people come to university with a very clear idea of the job they want to go into, but for a great many people, it’s a chance to have the life experiences which will help them figure out what they want to do with their life.

Gareth said: “The beauty of doing a Joint Honours was that I could dip my toe into different things. Performance analytics, coaching, and then with geography as well I got to experience the other side of it. It was incredibly varied and that was good for someone like me who didn’t really know what they wanted to do.”

Dr Des McDougall, Principal Lecturer in Geography at the University of Worcester said: “I’m so pleased to hear that Gareth has gone on to do so well in the world of journalism, we’re incredibly proud to have him as an alumni of our University.”

Des continued: “Gareth’s story just goes to show how the transferable skills you’ll pick up at university can help you in all areas of life. Studying Geography prepares our students for a host of jobs in all kinds of industries, from environmental consultancy to education, and as we see with Gareth, Journalism.”

He added: “We all continue to wish Gareth the very best as he continues in his chosen career.”