JCOM Courses Go Online

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JCOM Launches for Online Minor

The USU journalism department has opened cyberspace to a new era of online journalism instruction with several JCOM courses offered online as part of the department’s new online minor in journalism and public relations.

Beginning in Spring 2010, the full pre-major core for all JCOM majors—Newswriting (JCOM 1130), Intro to Mass Communication (JCOM 1500), and Media Smarts (JCOM 2010)—will be online, as will the PR core for an online minor.

The first online class, offered in Spring 2009, was beginning newswriting class. JCOM 2010—Media Smarts launched in Fall 2009, along with JCOM 2300—Introduction to Public Relations, and JCOM 2310—Writing for Public Relations.

Professor Ted “Pixelhead” Pease “test-drove” the basic newswriting and Media Smarts classes; PR faculty Preston Parker and Troy Oldham designed the online PR offerings.

“This is the future of the communication field—using new technologies to teach and apply both traditional and new journalism and PR skills,” said Pease, a veteran newspaper journalist and JCOM interim department head, who has taught at USU since 1994. “We’s excited to be expanding our reach in this way, exploring how students can learn their craft online and interactively, since that’s how so many of them will be making their livings after graduation.”

The online editions of the regular face-to-face classes reach students both on-campus and at a distance who work independently, through blogs and the university’s statewide interactive distance education network.

For more information about the JCOM Department at USU, and its new online PR minor, visit the department website, and JCOM’s award-winning student online news“paper,” the Hard News Café.

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