Communication has transformed your students’ world. At any given moment, they’re connecting with brands on social media, creating photos and videos to share with friends and making their voices heard by advocating for causes. In the College of Communication and Information (CCI) at Kent State, we prepare students to shape and transform the messages the world will consume today and long after they graduate.
WHO WE ARE
CCI offers eight different undergraduate majors and is the only College in the nation that houses media, communication, technology, design and information programs under one roof. That’s important for several reasons:
- The jobs of today and tomorrow will require students to have skills across these interrelated areas.
- Our signature, project-based courses give students the opportunity to solve multi-faceted problems or partner with local nonprofits, news outlets and businesses. Writers, designers, videographers and data/technology enthusiasts all work together to create story-based campaigns that have a real impact.
Our eight majors are: Advertising, Communication Studies, Digital Media Production, Emerging Media and Technology, Journalism, Photography (B.F.A.), Public Relations and Visual Communication Design (B.A. and B.F.A.).
INTRODUCING NEW PROGRAMS
Emerging Media and Technology Major
If the past year and a half has made one thing clear, it’s this: every business, non-profit and entrepreneur needs technical expertise in order to connect with the world. Our re-imagined Emerging Media and Technology major launched in Fall 2020 and meets this demand.
In Emerging Media and Technology, students explore how web and app development, augmented reality and coding fit into daily interactions, education and work environments. And they’ll graduate with a multitude of options, as careers in emerging media — web programming, data, creative coding, human-computer interaction and project management — are part of a rapidly growing job market.
(Emerging Media and Technology replaces the former Digital Sciences major.)
Interdisciplinary Minors
We’ve recently added a few interdisciplinary minors that respond to this generation’s desire to make a change in the world and build their technical skillsets. These minors pair well with any of our eight majors:
- Media Advocacy
- User Experience Design
- Web Design and Development
RANKINGS & DISTINCTION
Students across our College regularly stand out among their peers in intercollegiate competitions. This past spring, a CCI team earned national semifinalist status in the Effie Collegiate integrated marketing/communications competition. This competition partners with a well-known brand each year, and our students’ campaign for Bose headphones was among the top submissions for 2021.
Also in 2020-21, four journalism students placed in the top 20 nationally in the Hearst Journalism Awards, widely known as the Pulitzer Prize of Collegiate Journalism. And the short documentary “I Am,” created by our Female Filmmakers Initiative, has been accepted into three prestigious film festivals at the time of this writing.
REAL-WORLD EXPERIENCE MATTERS
We have a long-standing commitment to helping students build robust portfolios and gain professional experience early in their college careers. Below, you can see just a few ways we make this possible, with many paid opportunities included:
- IdeaBase: Student-powered creative agency that works with outside clients on user experience, advertising campaigns, web development and video.
- Student Media: 10 award-winning outlets (digital news, television, magazines and more) that provide campus news and entertainment.
- TeleProductions: Kent State’s video production center that designs promotional videos, live events (including Division I sports), web streaming and more.
WHAT’S HAPPENING NOW
- We’ve connected with an alumnus working in data at Spotify, and students in the course “Data in Emerging Media and Technology” are working with Spotify’s API to look at how the app quantifies music to predict user tastes.
- Students are learning about how food and communication are interrelated in the Communication Studies course “Media, Food and Foodways.”
- Our design students are using an iPad app, Procreate, to create animated digital illustrations and graphic novels.
- Students in our School of Media and Journalism are exploring virtual and augmented reality storytelling through the new course “Mixed Reality Storytelling.”
To hear more about these projects and others as they evolve, follow us on social media: @ccikentstate on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.