Department of Strategic Communication

Chairperson of the Department: Janice Smith (Interim)

Assistant Professors: Jana Duckett, Joonwoo Moon, Janice Smith

Associate Professors: Laura Dorsey-Elson

The Bachelor of Science in Strategic Communication combines public relations, advertising and other communication disciplines. To be successful in the 21st Century requires that students still learn how to identify key stakeholder publics and determine how to reach them. But the integration of media platforms and the proliferation of new media technologies have made that a more complex process requiring much more strategically focused approaches. In addition to learning how to write and develop materials for the traditional media, students learn how to use social media and other emerging technologies to ensure that all appropriate publics are reached.

As important as classroom instruction is, students need practical, hands-on experiences in as real world a setting as possible. They get those experiences in The Strategy Shop, a School of Global Journalism and Communication in-house strategic communications operation. Students will create real communications campaigns for real clients in a faculty-supervised setting.

Finally, because the world is interconnected in ways never dreamed possible in earlier decades and because so many businesses and organizations operate across national boundaries, the major in Strategic Communication has an important global focus. That focus has two directions. First, students learn about creating and executing communications campaigns for targeted audiences in different parts of the world in ways that recognize the diversity of those audiences. Second, students learn how the strategic communication process is viewed in other nations and how that affects how the process is done.

Goals

The following are the broad educational goals for the major in Strategic Communication:

to increase the numbers of highly trained strategic communication professionals, especially from among minorities and urban citizens;
to provide students with an understanding of strategic communication and the role it plays in identifying stakeholder publics and in designing and creating ethical messages to inform, to persuade, to manage crises and more;
to provide students with a global perspective about strategic communication and how it is perceived and accomplished in nations other than the United States;
to provide students with an understanding of strategic communication ethics and with basic media law, and
to provide students with hands-on experiences with strategic communication processes.

Learning Outcomes

The following are the learning outcomes expected for students in the Strategic Communication major.

Students will be able, under deadline, to craft compelling, accurate and ethical messages that adhere to styles appropriate to the media for which they are writing and to the stakeholder publics for which those messages are intended.
Students will be able to communicate messages in multiple formats, including mobile devices, social media and other new technologies.
Students will be able to demonstrate proficiency in research and information gathering techniques, including the wide range of digital sources that are available.
Students will be able to demonstrate proficiency in the various techniques of presenting messages including, but not limited to audio/video recording and editing, print media and digital media.
Students will be able to demonstrate proficiency in identifying stakeholder publics, developing campaigns to reach those publics and in creating messages that use the appropriate means of reaching those publics.

Programs

Bachelor of Science

Strategic Communication, B.S.