West Liberty University graduate Jessica Crighton ‘13, was selected as digital media assistant at the University of Hertfordshire, England recently.
Crighton, who’s from Chester, W.Va., earned her WLU degree in digital media with the College of Arts and Communications. She now lives in London and commutes by train to her position at the University of Hertfordshire, which is about 30 miles out of London.
“It’s a big university and has more than 25,000 students. London is my favorite city so I’m very happy,” Crighton said in an email interview. She visited London during her semester abroad program with the Washington Center, an internship program offered at WLU and even spent her last semester studying at Hertfordshire.
“I work on the website (herts.ac.uk) and my job entails pretty much everything that I learned in my digital media degree: graphic design, video production, online marketing, web, etc. I’m so happy with where I am and enjoy what I’m doing! I know my internships through the Washington Center and skills I learned in my degree helped me out immensely!
“I’m also happy I attended West Liberty. It allowed me to go to D.C. and London through The Washington Center which I think is one of the best programs West Liberty offers it’s students.” West Liberty offers its students opportunities to work and study abroad through the Washington Center and is the largest internship placement organization in Washington, D.C.
“Jessica was a great student and one of many from her family to graduate from WLU. It’s not a surprise she is finding success right after graduation. She’s smart, creative, driven and very sincere. She was able to take the high tech skills she learned in college and package that with excellent creative and story telling skills,” said one of her instructors here at WLU, Brian Fencl. Fencl is professor of art and chair of the department of communications studies and visual art.
“All of the teachers I had at West Liberty cared about their student’s success and were so helpful. I will look back fondly on the MAD festival (which I consider an Art Department Celebration and was my favorite time of the year on the hill) as well as all of the AIGA functions I attended,” she said, referring to the annual spring Media Art and Design exhibition (MAD) and the American Institute for Graphic Arts club that is very active on the WLU campus.
“On the communications side, I learned so much from my experience at WGLZ radio. I’m thankful for being taught to use professional video equipment in my video production classes. I’ll now be using this knowledge to make videos at my job. I learned everything that helped me start my professional career.
The College of Arts and Communication includes the Department of Media and Visual Arts and the department of music and theatre. For more information, please contact Dean Bill Baronak at wbaronak@westliberty.edu.