Journalism

Ben Austin covers news at the State House

Print & Multimedia Journalism major Ben Austin writes for Boston.com. (Filmed and edited by Emerson students.)

Emerson’s Department of Journalism has adopted a dynamic new curriculum for students entering in Fall 2011 or later, and students from earlier classes who “opt in.” The courses emphasize a convergent, multimedia approach to storytelling and news reporting. Students will learn to report and produce news using words, audio, video, and web.

To that end, all students following the new curriculum will be considered Journalism majors, rather than Broadcast Journalism or Print and Multimedia Journalism majors.

General Program Requirements

The BS in Journalism program requires the completion of 44 journalism credit hours. All students must complete these core courses:

JR 101	Discovering Journalism
JR 102	The Newsgathering Process
JR 103	The Digital Journalist
JR 202	Beat Reporting Across Media
JR 211	Law for Journalism (2 credits)
JR 212	Ethics for Journalists (2 credits)
PL 225	U.S. Government and Politics

(Journalism majors are required to take PL 225 to satisfy one of their General Education requirements in History, Social, and Behavioral Sciences. This course does not count toward the 44 credit hours required in the major.)

Students must take at least one course from each of the following pods:

Cultural Affairs

JR 240	Sports Reporting
JR 365	Topics in Cultural Affairs
JR 367	Topics in Business & Consumer Reporting
JR 555	Reporting Issues of Diversity

Public Affairs

JR 292	Public Affairs Reporting
JR 364	Topics in Specialized Reporting
JR 366	Topics in Science, Technology & Health
JR 570	Global Journalism

Students must take at least one course from one of the following platforms:

Broadcast Platform

JR 216	Advanced Audio-Video Journalism
JR 318	TV News Producing
JR 419	ENG/TV News Reporting
JR 561	TV News Magazine and Documentary

Writing Platform

JR 261	Feature Writing
JR 352	Opinion: Columns, Reviews, Editorials
JR 353	Reporting & Writing Complex Stories
JR 354	News Editing and Design
JR 562	The Magazine

Multimedia Platform

JR 220	Interactive News
JR 221	Photojournalism
JR 368	Topics in Advanced Multimedia
JR 450	Metro News Service Collaboration
JR 574	The Press and Propaganda

Choose one of the following capstone courses:

JR 490	Online Publishing
JR 491	Broadcast Practicum
JR 492	Deep Reporting Capstone
JR 493	Backpack Journalist
JR 495	Multimedia Journalism Practicum (summer only)

Choose two additional Journalism electives from any category above.

Note: At least three major courses must be at the 300 level or above.

Journalism