Courses to help students connect, teach basic skills
The Harrington School of Communication and Media at the University of Rhode Island has updated its curriculum to give Harrington students a shared skill set across majors and to create a tighter-knit community among students.
The new Harrington Core Curriculum requires students to take four introductory courses, COM 100: Fundamentals of Communication, WRT 104: Writing to Inform and Explain, SCM 105: Production and Presentation Fundamentals and JOR 110: Introduction to Mass Media or FLM 101: Introduction to Film Media, according to the new curriculum sheet. In addition to these core classes, all graduating seniors will have to participate in a capstone course in their major or majors.
This new curriculum was just put into place this year. Only current freshmen and students in later classes will be required to take these courses.
These courses will fulfill the A3, A4, B1, B2, B4, C1 and C2 general education credits. According to Ammina Kothari, the director of the Harrington School, they will also teach students written skills, oral skills, production skills, the ability to analyze media critically, the ability to communicate with a sense of ethics and the responsibility and the ability to understand research.
One of the required courses, SCM 105: Production and Presentation Fundamentals, is an entirely new course where students are learning skills in video production and presenting. The goal of the class is to teach students basic skills that they will expand on later in other Harrington classes, according to Kothari.
“They are learning how to make different types of videos using their mobile phones and how to edit that,” she said. “They are also learning how to make presentations. Whatever other classes students take, they are going to be able to build on some basic knowledge that they got from this class.”
Kothari also said the capstone course for each major, which is now required by the Harrington School, will focus on helping students create a digital portfolio that they can use when applying for jobs.
The change was prompted when the Harrington Curriculum Committee, made up of Harrington School faculty members, examined the old curriculum and decided they wanted all Harrington students to have a certain skill set.
Kothari hopes that these classes will give Harrington School students a baseline of experience across communication and media disciplines.
Kevin McClure, a professor of communication studies and the program advisor for sports media and communication, said that the new requirements are going to build better relationships among the students in Harrington School since they will be in more shared classes.
He said students will still be able to complete multiple majors with this new curriculum and it may even be easier for students to double major because some of these core courses are prerequisites for higher courses and fulfill general education outcomes.
“All the rules for double majoring haven’t changed,” McClure said. “You can still share 12 credits between any two majors. That was all part of this idea of creating synergies within the programs. That’s a different thing we’re trying to do.”