By Joanna Reid and Lizz Panchyk
Adelphi currently offers up to 37 undergraduate and graduate programs within the College of Arts and Sciences, among them Communications. Presently, students can achieve a Bachelor's degree, minor or study a concentration in Communications. In July, Peggy Cassidy, the department chair, sent out an email sharing that New Media has been added as a concentration alongside Digital Media Production, Journalism & Public Relations and Media Studies.
“[T]he media environment has changed to include many other potential types of media-making, and this is a direction in which many students want to go,” said Cassidy. “As we began creating new courses in these areas, we also started to realize that we could create a concentration that really focuses on those newer media forms.”
The description on the Adelphi website states, “In the New Media concentration, you will gain new skills in new media, including creating web sites, DVDs and social networking accounts. You will also learn authorship software, while gaining perspective on the effective use of interactivity and non-linear architecture for creating effective media.”
The courses that count toward the New Media concentration will include “Drones: Piloting, Photography, and Videography,” “Creating the Podcast: Audio Storytelling,” “Cyber Law & Ethics,” “Bitcoin & Blockchain” and “Interactive Art & Digital Media.” Although these courses already exist, Cassidy said. “We plan to develop new courses in areas like social and mobile media, the social impact of technological change, data visualization and more advanced drone work (such as 3D modeling and mapping).”