Bass School Expands Communication Study Options with New Degree

A new Bachelor of Arts in professional communication and digital media studies will debut this fall at The University of Texas at Dallas.

Students interested in technical communication and digital media will have the opportunity to enroll in the program through the Harry W. Bass Jr. School of Arts, Humanities, and Technology.

Though UT Dallas offers a concentration in communication studies within the Bachelor of Arts in visual and performing arts, the new degree combines several disciplines and will enable students to pursue careers in technical professional editing, instruction design or other fields, said Dr. John Gooch, area head for communication studies at the Bass School.

“We want to train students with job skills in the communication arena at large,” said Gooch, who also is associate professor of rhetoric and communication studies. “We want them to be good visual, oral, written and digital communicators. We see the student who has this degree fitting in different communication-related occupations.”

Thirteen new classes will be offered in the fall, including Communicating in the World of AI, Communication and Popular Culture, TV and Radio Announcing, Political Discourse in a Digital Era, Digital Media and the 21st Century, and Storytelling in Professional Contexts. Students also will have an opportunity to take classes in Public Speaking, Media and Culture, and Journalism in a Networked Age.

“We can provide students with the degree that combines these elements,” Gooch said.

UTD communication studies faculty members have been eager to create a bachelor’s degree in this area for some time.

“We were able to come together as a faculty and form a program,” Gooch said. “We put forth a proposal for a communication degree about a year ago.”

It was approved by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board in April.

The concentration in digital media studies will be for students who want to dive deeper into the impact of social media on politics, culture and interpersonal as well as social relationships. The goal, Gooch said, is to explore “how do we think about digital media and be reflective of how we’re using it, and what does it mean to be engaged in social media in the 21st century?”

More than 5 billion people in the world (more than 62% of the population) used social media last year, and that number is growing as people spend an average of 2 ½ hours a day on platforms such as Facebook or messaging apps, according to Statista, a global data and business intelligence platform.

In addition, media jobs are in demand, with a projected growth of 6% between 2023 and 2033, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics; demand for technical communicators will expand 4% during the next decade.

During their last semester in the new program, students will have an opportunity to pursue a capstone project or an internship, Gooch said.

“We’re really excited about this,” he said. “I think they can make these skills applicable to different careers.”