Changes Coming to Western Carolina University's Communication Department

Greetings, everyone. There was a really interesting meeting today. The meeting was a requirement for everyone in the Communication Department, meaning that I was not required to attend, but I did anyway.

You see, I may be an English Major, but my concentration is Journalism. This means that many of my classes are from the Communication Department. There is a lot of crossover between English classes and Communication classes. As it turns out, it was a good thing I attended this meeting, as something that was mentioned affects anyone taking the same concentration as me.

The meeting began at 3:00, with everyone filing into the auditorium at the top of the hour. I was early, and was able to sneak in even though I'm not a Communication major.

Upon taking my seat, I noticed there was a professor walking around in front of the stage. This professor very much resembled Steve Jobs. This professor, a Dr. Matthias, was even wearing a black turtle-neck shirt and wireframe glasses.

Dr. Connelly was leading the meeting, giving all the announcements. The first announcement concerned the annual Communications Dept. spring picnic. This is something I've never even heard of, since I'm off in the English Department (and I am damn proud of being an English Major).

Dr. Connelly went on to introduce all the staff members present. This included Dr. Dulaney, the professor for my Ethics class (and someone who is quickly becoming a favorite professor of mine).

Then he was down to business, beginning with commentary on budget issues concerning not just the Communication Department, but Western Carolina University as a whole. WCU is funded entirely by the state of North Carolina. As of now, you're well aware of the global economic crisis we're going through.

This is affecting WCU now. The first evidence of this is the fact that the August graduation ceremony has been officially canceled, due to budget cuts. The August ceremony is the most expensive of the three annual graduation ceremonies. Diplomas will still be sent in the mail around that time, but the official ceremony will not be held. Graduates will be allowed to walk in the December ceremony.

Dr. Connelly addressed this point, as he expects many graduates at this point to decide not to walk in the December graduation ceremony. The thought had crossed my mind. He went on to say that the graduation ceremony was not meant for us students, as individuals. The ceremony is meant for parents, friends, anyone who has helped and supported you along the way.

More was said about budget. This fall semester, WCU will face an 8% overall budget cut. The number may seem small, but it is forcing some drastic changes at Western. For the foreseeable future, Western will be increasing class size, and holding most classes either in the early morning or in the evening.

That's all the gloom and doom. The next bit went on to address some good news concerning the Communication Dept.

First of all, among the 185 students in the Communication Department, the current average GPA is 3.11. This has lead the staff of the department to begin a project to make WCU's Comm. Dept. a standard of excellence not just in the state of North Carolina, but in the Southeast region.

For the past couple of years, Comm. Department staff has been at work on "The Project", which was kept entirely secret not just from students, but other departments at Western. The Project is an endeavor to make the department among the top in WCU, in NC, and throughout this region of the United States. Efforts were made to update the program to remain competitive, to allow students more academic freedom, and to streamline the degree program.

The main purpose of this meeting was to finally reveal the details of "The Project".

First of all, any student at Western who is either in the Communication Department or who is required to take Communication classes for their major, has been familiar with all the different prefixes used in the Communication Department. Among the different classes, you see such prefixes as "CMCR" (Communication Core), "CMPM" (Communication Print Media), "CMPR" (Communication Public Relations), and so on. The first task was to simplify all of this by switching to a single prefix. Starting in the fall, all classes in the department will have the same prefix: COMM. This will make finding classes in the department much easier.

In each major, there are concentrations, which are subsections that provide a focus on different areas. Starting in the fall semester, there will be five concentrations in the Communication Department.

These five concentrations are:
--Broadcasting
--Broadcasting Sales
--Journalism
--Organizational Communication
--Public Relations

As I mentioned earlier, I am an English Major, with a concentration in Journalism. The mention of Journalism in the above list caught my attention. Starting in the fall, the Journalism concentration is being removed entirely from the English Department and housed in the Communication Department. This was a huge announcement, as far as I was concerned.

A new idea being used in the fall is the idea of "Pre-Major". New students who are thinking of going into the Communication Department must take and pass (with at least a grade of C) two classes, those being COMM 150 and COMM 240. Once a student passes both of these with a sufficient grade, they can proceed to the Communication Major program.

The degree program for this has been streamlined. Where before students had to take 26 hours (I noticed this, as my Journalism concentration requires 36 hours), the core Communication degree program will now only require 14 hours. This means that the core program could theoretically be completed in just one semester (the max. number of hours a student can take per semester is 19, with the minimum for full-time student status being 12).

While the pre-major provides six hours, and the core program adds on 14 hours, there is also the concentration. Each of the five concentrations requires 18 hours to complete. Adding these numbers together gives 38 hours. Add to this the 42 hours required for liberal studies, and each Communication Major student will have 80 hours. The state of North Carolina requires students to have 120 hours in order to graduate.

What happens with those remaining 40 hours? This is where the idea of student academic freedom comes into play. Students have the option of doing any number of things with those remaining hours, including opting for a dual-degree. You could gain a degree in one concentration, and another degree in another concentration. This means that, for instance, a student could get a dual-degree in Journalism and Broadcasting. That is a dual-degree I really wish I could obtain, but I'm graduating after this semester.

Dr. Connelly's final message about all of these changes is that, from now on, the Communications Department means "Academic Freedom". The whole idea is to elevate the quality of the education and degree to a standard that competes with the top schools throughout the nation.

I am excited about the changes coming to the Comm. Dept.. However, this is my last semester at Western, so I will not be able to benefit from the changes. To all of the new and upcoming students, I am excited for you. There are a lot of opportunities in store for you.

An Oftentimes Dead Blog

So here I am, updating this blog. Yes, I know this is a practically-dead blog, and you might be wondering why I am even bothering to update this. I usually update over on my LiveJournal blog, mainly because I prefer the user interface that LiveJournal offers.

Anyway, I'm back on this blog, don't know how often I'll post here. Let's make the most of it, shall we?

Things are going well this semester. I don't have that much coursework outside of classes right now, but there are some projects going on. First, there's the website project I'm working on for my ENG. 401 ("Writing for Careers") class. Second, there are the lessons I'm working on completing for my CMPM 404 ("Desktop Publishing") class. Those are basically just following lessons in a textbook, and I finished the last one of those yesterday.

Funny thing about that: I'm way ahead of the rest of the class. Everyone else is basically on the seventh lesson, and I just finished the tenth and final lesson yesterday. Now I'm ready to start on the first actual project for that class. I'll be able to create a document of my own in InDesign.

What else is going on? My plans for going on the Japan trip this May have fallen through. Brief explanation: each May, Takeda-Sensei offers a course that is based around a two-week trip to Japan, visiting different locations (including Naruto University, and locations in Osaka). I'm not able to go on this trip simply because I can't get financial aid to cover the cost, and I don't have near enough to pay the cost on my own.

:-(

Oh, well. Would've been fun, but it's not happening.

Ah, right, my webcomic, "A Step Out of Phase", is going extremely well. I'm working on the "Other Journeys" story arc, which is fun to write. I've got a lot of plot twists in mind, and this will eventually tie into the yet-ongoing plot from Volume One.

Not much else for me to discuss. I'll return to this blog soon, hopefully.

Good day.