Degrees Offered:
Bachelor of Science (B.S.)
Concentrations:
- Digital Communications
- Strategic Communications
Mass Communications Degree
Overview
Barton’s Mass Communications program offers pre-professional training that prepares students for entry-level positions in specific industries and for graduate school. The program features two areas of concentration: Digital Communications and Strategic Communications. And because these two areas share many courses, completing both concentrations — and enhancing your marketability — is easy.
Minors
Non-majors can earn a minor in one of the two concentration areas: Digital Communications and Strategic Communications. The general requirement for a minor is completion of 21 semester hours of designated courses for each concentration area. Please contact the School of Arts & Humanities for more information.
Special Features
Students will spend at least three semesters in practicum courses gaining hands-on work experience in their area of concentration. You may find yourself running sound for on-campus theatre productions, producing shows in our on-campus television studio, or working on the campus newspaper.
Concentrate in Digital Communications, and you’ll gain the multimedia skills to research information and deliver messages to your audience about the current events as part of a democratic society. The program will make an emphasis on multiplatform messaging mixing Print, Video, Audio and Digital Content. You will learn to produce shows, programs and shorts with professional standards using Sara Lynn Riley Kennedy Recording Studio, which offers a large format analog console and the production facilities of WEDT, Barton College’s educational television station. The WEDT studio, Phyllis Parish Howard Control Room, and editing labs feature updated equipment, cameras, computers, and software.
Students in the Strategic Communications concentration will become communicators who can understand, process and craft messages to help with the communication needs of their clients. The Program includes an in-depth study of online information flows and techniques to successfully navigate the XXI media landscape, with a special emphasis on sports communications.
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Course Information
As a Digital Communications student, you’ll take courses such as Video Production, Audio in Media, Digital Storytelling and Multiplatform Reporting.
Strategic Communications students will take courses in Principles of Public Relations, Public Relations Strategies and Campaigns, Public Relations Case Studies and Sports and Communications.
Upper-level courses include Law and Ethics in Mass Media and the Senior Seminar course, which requires completion of a capstone project. The Senior Seminar additionally assists you with interviewing skills and writing your résumé — just what you need if you’re preparing to enter graduate school or searching for a job.
Internships
An internship is the single most important step toward employment. That’s why you’re required to complete an internship as part of your degree.
Audio recording students have recently interned at:
- Black Lodge Recording, Eudora, Kansas
- IMI, Ivey Music International, Nashville, Tennessee
- Mill West Studios, Fayetteville
- Osceola Recording Studios, Raleigh
- Radio Express, Inc., Burbank, California
- Sea Note Recording, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
Broadcast/video students have interned at many North Carolina commercial and public television stations. These include:
- WNCT in Greenville
- WLFL in Raleigh
- WNCN in Raleigh
- WRAZ in Raleigh
- WUNC in Raleigh
- WITN in Washington
Journalism students have recently interned at:
- The Wilson Daily Times
- The Arts Council of Wilson
- The Spring Hope Enterprise
- The Kenly News
- The Selma News
Clubs and Organizations
Barton sponsors a chapter of the Society for Collegiate Journalists, a national organization that recognizes scholastic achievement for majors in all four mass communications concentrations.