Last week's MediaGuardian focus on journalism training elicited a host of letters - among them responses from current trainees, former reporters and journalism teachers
· The class bias in journalism (A job for the wealthy and connected, April 7) is caused by abysmal starting salaries, not too much education. When other companies want to improve their intake of new talent, they don't complain that they are being priced out by the high cost of degrees and postgraduate courses. They compete to attract the best by setting up sandwich courses and bursaries, and increasing their starting salaries. The media (all of it) has become complacent because it is so easy to attract very clever young people without bothering to go out and look for them. Angela Phillips, convenor, MA journalism, department of media and communications, Goldsmiths College, London
· I know it's common for those who've been in any business for a long time to say of current practice, "That never would've happened in my day," but in the case of journalism and the appalling way kids on work experience are ripped off, it's actually true. When I did a week's work experience on my local paper, the Kingston-based Surrey Comet, in 1978 I was keen to do another but the NUJ was firm with the editor: if you need someone for more than a week, you need to hire them. I was hired. The truly shameful way journalism graduates are treated today, as outlined by Gavriel Hollander (Mixed experience for thousands of "workies", April 7), would never have been allowed in the "bad old days" of the 70s when unions had power. Any editor who uses an unpaid intern for more than a couple of weeks should be ashamed. If you need someone to do a job of work, you should pay them. If you don't pay them, well, we're journalists so let's call it what it is, eh? Slavery. Laura Marcus, Leek, Staffs
· Although I admired your analysis of institutional socio-economic and nepotistic bias within journalism, it came as no surprise that in the same issue that contained a report identifying journalism as a career that "has become a graduate-entry profession ... [that is] more socially exclusive than it was", the Guardian training programme (p14) offered a chance "to equip the successful candidate with the skills to pursue a career in journalism. Candidates must have completed a degree programme or equivalent." Phil Thornton, Runcorn, Cheshire
· In the two years since I turned freelance, I have been able to conduct my own investigation into the need to cultivate "pals at court" (A job for the wealthy and connected, Media Guardian, April 7 2008). It turns out that getting work without connections is the least of a freelancer's worries; without the right connections, it's impossible even to get a response from most publications. Having commissioned freelancers myself, I am familiar with the reluctance to use writers whose work is unfamiliar. Nevertheless, during my hectic schedule as a commissioning editor, I did manage to compose a brief email to writers who had submitted feature proposals explaining that I wouldn't be commissioning them. It's a shame that so many of today's courtiers don't have manners enough to do the same. David McCarthy, Hereford
· I liked your "ain't it awful" piece on how upper middle-class twits run the British press (A job for the wealthy and connected, Peter Wilby). I once had the pleasure of doing some work experience at the Guardian. It was the whitest place in all of London. And the accents ... all posh. What I'd like to know is what is the Guardian going to do about its appalling lack of diversity? And putting Gary Younge's pic everywhere - look, a black man! - doesn't cut it. It's all very well wringing your hands, but don't pretend you're not part of the problem. By writing an "exposé" of the media, you're not absolving yourself of responsibility for the parlous state of this up-its-own-arse industry. Yuki Mitsu, London
· Just read the four-page spread regarding journalism for the well-off, and the article could not have been printed at a better time. You see, I found out today that I have just been accepted for a postgraduate diploma in newspaper journalism at the noSWeat Journalism Centre in London. At first I was ecstatic - this is something I have wanted to do all my life - but then the truth dawned. I'm 20, I come from a working-class background in Stoke-on-Trent, and I'm currently in my final year at university, while working part-time as a broadcast assistant. I received my offer of a place at NoSweat after the deadline to apply for an NCTJ bursary had passed, so without any assisted funding or help I will have to turn down the offer. The poor/rich divide will continue to widen if more and more journalists come from middle- and upper-class backgrounds, and this will be reflected in the media, which cannot be a positive thing. Kelly Smith, Stoke-on-Trent
·Janette Owen (No Oxbridge, no worries) bears testimony to the fact that talent, tenacity and an element of luck will lead to a successful career. This is not unique to journalism. As an example, during the revolution that took place in Fleet Street during the 1980s there was a need to understand and embrace new technology. As an art desk man at this time, I drew pages by hand for the Mirror and Star but then found myself having to transfer layouts using a set of computerised instructions. Subeditors also wrestled with mysterious codes to enable them to directly input their copy. Two things happened. The first was an overnight change on the editorial floor. Gone were the days of banter, noise, calling for "copy", messengers running to and fro, and general hubbub. Subs were now staring blankly at computer screens, and the only sound was when a file mysteriously disappeared from the screen. The second was that a good sub who couldn't get to grips with the new way of working was often partnered with a sub who, until then, had been on the "dead monkey" shift subbing TV listings. The listings sub could understand new technology and suddenly found himself in great demand. The level playing field was once again established - both journalistic and new technology talent was utilised - just as in the graduate and non-graduate partnerships of today. Peter Bowes, Cheadle
· As a student on City University's print journalism course who neither attended a fee-paying school nor one of the four universities mentioned in Peter Wilby's article, I suppose I might be considered proof of equal opportunities there. Unfortunately the reality is that postgraduate journalism courses tacitly discriminate against people from low-income families by officially requiring students to undertake work experience (in City's case, 10 weeks' minimum) as part of the course. Only people from wealthy families can afford to do so much unpaid work. Josh Loeb, London
· During my 40 years in the trade, the prospective employer most likely to insist on a degree - preferably an Oxbridge one - and on high-placed connections was the BBC. As a secondary modern schoolboy in the late 1950s I wrote to the corporation asking how I could become a radio reporter. Personnel replied that I should work for a local newspaper for three years and gain the NCTJ's proficiency certificate. Having achieved this with the Croydon Advertiser Group, in 1965, I answered an advertisement for the newly created World at One programme on the Home Service (now Radio 4) which claimed to be looking for a "young reporter who has just completed his indentures on a local newspaper and is NCTJ-qualified". The person who got the job was a Cambridge student involved with the university newspaper who, unlike me, had not learned shorthand and typing, attended council meetings, magistrates' courts and inquests and made regular calls to police and fire brigades. He and his brother went on to have illustrious careers in radio and TV. This pattern was repeated through three decades. One patronising ex-military regional controller complained about my south London accent. (Even dear old Arthur Smith is a graduate of the University of East Anglia!) Judging from the fact that the present controller of Radio 4, Mark Damazer, is Cambridge-educated, as are at least six of his regular presenters, including Matthew Parris and Sandi Toksvig, the Beeb's appointments department is as elitist as it ever was. David Savage, Essex
· Peter Wilby's article "A job for the wealthy and connected" summed up a lot of the issues faced by an industry which is strangling recruitment from those who lack finance or social influence. We were both particularly involved in training people from the minority ethnic communities to become reporters. It seems as if little if anything has improved. Indeed, we wonder if many of the types of people who came on our access and professional training courses would today be able to afford the training or find places to work. However, though Wilby quotes from many sources, we were surprised that nothing was mentioned about the NUJ, who probably have the best information about who is being trained and who gets recruited. Even more disappointing was the single paragraph about organisations who financially support trainees from ethnic minorities. Had he contacted the NUJ they at least would have put him in touch with the George Viner Memorial Trust Fund, which has been providing bursaries for minority ethnic trainees for many long years before the NCTJ finally woke up to the problem. The fund has so far helped over 150 Black and Asian young aspiring journalists with their course fees, books, accommodation, mentoring and careers guidance The NUJ would also have put him in touch with its own Black Members' Council, which could have told him at first hand the problems in training, recruitment and career development faced by ethnic minority journalists in the UK. Lionel Morrison and Tony Goldman, London
· I am writing in response to Gavriel Hollander's story about work experience. I too am on a postgraduate journalism course, and have accrued a wide variety of unpaid work experience at various newspapers, magazines and websites. I have come to the conclusion, like Hollander, that what you gain from such placements varies greatly from place to place. However, I also think that if a placement is a waste of time, and nothing is being either learned or contributed, it is perfectly acceptable to walk out. If those on work experience are being exploited, they really have only themselves to blame for accepting the situation. When I was studying for my undergraduate degree in Southampton, I pestered (in the nicest possible sense) the editor of the local paper for months before he granted me a week's work experience. By that time, I was editing my university's music and arts paper, and had to take the time off from that job, and from my studies, to do this work experience. After a first day spent doing 10 minutes of photocopying, and 7 hours and 50 minutes sitting at a desk being told there was nothing for me to do or see, I decided not to return. A week later, the editor phoned me on my mobile and asked why I had been so persistent in trying to gain experience there only to leave after a day, and I explained that I felt my time was better spent in my own - albeit student - newsroom actually doing some work, than in his, doing nothing. Since then, I have had many valuable and interesting work experience placements. I have also walked out of a placement at a technology website when I learned by accident that I was covering a full-time writer's paid holiday leave - for free. Although the work was rewarding and I was getting bylines, I thought it was unfair both on me and on the person whose job I was covering that I was doing work that is usually remunerated. Emmanuelle Smith, London
· Peter Wilby's depressing analysis of recruitment into journalism raises the wrong kind of academic question - not the one about today's elitist entrants being too academic (most of them are palpably no such thing) but whether there is any point any more in becoming a newsman. Most editors in both Fleet Street and the provinces have spent the last decade shedding high-budget reporters' jobs in favour of low-budget know-all columnists - the men with the Big Picture as the American reporter AJ Liebling called them - who never go anywhere but have infinite wisdom. My father and I both started on local papers at 16. He became a foreign correspondent on the Observer; I spent 40 years as a reporter on broadsheet newspapers and loved every minute. Even before I read Flat Earth News, Nick Davies's excellent obituary of a once-noble calling, I'd lost count of the times I'd said "Thank God I don't work for that lot any more". Today's hacks, graduate or no, seem to spend most of their time toiling in the newsroom equivalent of trireme galleys rewriting the same PR handout or wire stuff for their papers' blogs, online news media ghettoes and assorted websites read by anoraks. Glorified secretaries, really. They probably even make tea for the subs. My heart bleeds for all of them. Peter Dunn, Bridport
· I read Peter Wilby's article on a day when I was interviewing candidates for City University's MA/postgraduate diploma in broadcast journalism. In the last week we have interviewed 90 applicants for 46 places. The majority have attended state schools. Of the successful candidates approximately 60% are female, over 12% are from visible ethnic minorities, and almost all do extra work in bars, offices and shops in their holidays or at weekends. We also take non-graduates at our discretion and in the past have accepted a psychiatric nurse, an actor and a fashion designer, all in their thirties. I was unsure what Mr Wilby was advocating. I was the first member of my family to gain a degree. When I tried to become a journalist in 1973 I was rejected by my local paper as "over-educated for a girl" then they relented and offered me "something on the woman's page". I didn't take the job. I finally gained work experience in BBC local radio after joining a queue of women interviewees for receptionist. Take it from me, it was not a character building experience! I am in no doubt that whatever the flaws in the system today it is fairer than it was, and the students we take at City have a great deal more life experience and good humour than some of the narrow-minded men I worked with in the 70s. Of course I did not have the privilege of working with Mr Wilby, who I'm sure was very fair and decent. With that in mind, I'd like to invite him to meet this year's cohort here at City. I'm sure he'll be pleasantly surprised. Lis Howell, director of broadcasting, City University, London
· Peter's Wilby's argument that the postgraduate courses at City University are the privilege of the wealthy is undermined by his own employer. The Scott Trust, which owns the Guardian, is paying the fees of three of my colleagues who might not otherwise be able to cover the expense. Not only that but the trust sets them up with work experience at papers such as the Guardian, Observer and Manchester Evening News and pays accommodation costs over the holidays. The course is certainly expensive and to be able to afford it I was given funding by my undergraduate university and I have a bank loan. A number of other colleagues have substantial or full funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council as well as various loans. The idea that the only reason we are there is because we have rich parents to pick up the tab is insulting. Everyone struggles with the financial burden but sees it as an investment. His "sample", which gives the idea that most students come from the same four universities, is also inaccurate. While there are indeed a number from Oxford, Cambridge, Bristol and Leeds there are also people from Exeter, Southampton, Nottingham, St Andrews, Manchester, UCL, Imperial, Durham and Lancaster as well as many others. Peter Wilby's blinkered view of the young people entering his profession is both inaccurate and disheartening. Laura Harding, City University
