A New Approach to MM&C Courses and Course Scheduling

I'm pleased to announce a significant change in the way MM&C courses are offered and scheduled. Beginning this fall, MM&C will offer a small number of courses that are designed specifically for doctoral students; i.e., the assignments, readings, discussions, expectations for participation, and evaluation criteria in these courses will be those appropriate for advanced, doctoral-level students. Although these courses will be open to interested and qualified SCAT or other Temple graduate students, all non-MM&C students will need to get the written permission of the instructor to register.

Only the new doctoral level courses will be listed as MMC courses in printed and online course schedules and bulletins. To avoid confusion, courses offered by MM&C will not be cross-listed with courses offered by SCAT departments (and vice versa).

MM&C students will continue to take, and receive credit toward the MM&C degree for taking, all appropriate courses offered by all SCAT departments. They will also continue to get credit toward their required 37 credits of MM&C coursework by taking the master's level versions (offered by SCAT departments) of the courses that were previously cross-listed.

All MM&C courses that fulfill the core requirements of the Program will continue to be offered in the evening, although at the earlier time of 4:30 - 7:50. Most other MM&C courses will be offered in the evening as well, although in the future and depending on student input, some courses will likely be scheduled during the day.

The specific MM&C courses offered each semester will be based on a stable rotating schedule designed to allow MM&C students to plan their coursework and take better advantage of the diverse and valuable course offerings in SCAT and across the Temple campus.

Details of the multi-year rotating schedule will be announced in the fall. But we now have a finalized schedule of course offerings for the 2002-2003 year, which is reproduced below. The fall courses on Temple's online course schedule (at <http://www.temple.edu>) are now correct (some courses no longer offered through MM&C but still available from SCAT departments are still listed but with no open seats).

The MM&C faculty are confident that these important changes will help us offer our students a richer and more rewarding educational experience. None of these changes would have been possible without the strong support of SCAT Dean Concetta Stewart, Associate Dean Jeff Rush, Assistant Dean of Technology and Planning Sandy Kyrish, BTMM Department Chair Betsy Leebron, and JPRA Department Chair Karen Turner, and I want to thank them publicly here.

Please let me know if you have any questions, and best wishes for a relaxing and productive summer!

Matthew Lombard

MM&C Director

lombard@temple.edu

MM&C Course Schedule for 2002-2003 (all courses are doctoral level)

Fall 2002:

Core courses (required of all first year students):

MMC 400 Communication Theory I (Morris)

MMC 500 Researching Communication I (Mendelson)

MMC 945 Doctoral Colloquium: Introduction to MM&C (Lombard)

Electives (only for students who have completed first year coursework):

Area: Psychology and Communication

     MMC 642 Psychological Processing of Media (Lombard)

Spring 2003:

Core courses (required of all first year students):

MMC 540 Communication Theory II (Fernback)

MMC 420 Researching Communication II (Darling-Wolf)

MMC 945 Doctoral Colloquium: Writing Workshop (Morris)

Electives (only for students who have completed first year coursework):

Area: Methods/Tools

     MMC 503 Advanced Quantitative Analysis (Lombard)

Area: Global Communication

     MMC 729 Global Telecommunications (Stewart)

Area: History and Cultural Studies

     MMC 612 Critical Analysis of Mass Media (Kitch)