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Classes are designed to challenge your thinking and develop your professional skills. You’ll leave each class with a unique set of tools to approach new communications challenges.

Tailor your experience to your career goals by focusing on one of eight areas of specialization. Use the search widget below to sort classes by quarter, specialization, instructor and degree track for each quarter. Get a comprehensive view of the full academic year in our Course Guide.

View the University of Washington Academic Calendar for important dates, including quarter start and end dates, registration dates and deadlines, and campus holidays.

Registration numbers (SLNs) are located on the Time Schedule. Please read the Department’s statement on internet resource requirements for access to courses.

COMMLD 520D: Product Marketing

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

MCDM Elective | 5 Credits
Tuesdays 1/6 – 3/10, 6:00pm – 9:50pm | Room on Time Schedule
Registration SLN: 22335

Course Description:

This course explores how modern organizations bring products to market by connecting customer insight, storytelling, and strategy. Students will learn the core functions of product marketing within technology and SaaS organizations and examine how effective collaboration among product, sales, marketing, and customer success teams drives successful product launches. Through hands-on projects and real-world case studies, students will practice applying research, storytelling, and data-driven decision-making to launch and promote products that resonate with diverse audiences and deliver measurable results.

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COMMLD 581: Leadership in Emerging Technologies & Trends: Communications in the Age of AI

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

Open Elective | 5 Credits
Sundays 1/11 (online), 1/18, 1/25, 2/1, 2/15, 9:00am – 5:00pm | Room on Time Schedule
Registration SLN: 12664

Course Description:

AI is transforming how organizations communicate, and the skill gap is real. The 2025 World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report states that “On average, workers can expect that two-fifths (39%) of their existing skill sets will be transformed or become outdated over the 2025-2030 period.” AI and information processing technologies tops the list as the core drivers of this change.

This intensive class is about getting out in front. We’ll dive into the questions communication leaders are wrestling with right now: When should you use AI for comms and who should be empowered to use it? What are the risks if your team is unprepared, if you are too slow in adapting, or if you use it in inappropriate or ineffective ways? And how do you build policies and strategies that allow AI to accelerate work responsibly and ethically?

Students should come prepared for an intensive experience, with a full quarter’s work conducted over a 6-week time period. Class sessions will be fast-paced, hands-on, and grounded in real-world challenges. You’ll use multiple AI tools in class and for homework, debate outputs and scenarios, discuss best practices for decision-making, and hear from industry experts already implementing AI inside their organizations. The goal is to give you the tools and judgment to help you and your future employer navigate fast-evolving AI with confidence. 

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COMMLD 559: Law, Data, & Privacy

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

MCDM Elective | Meets Law & Ethics Requirement | 5 Credits
Tuesdays 1/6 – 3/10, 6:00pm – 9:50pm | Room on Time Schedule
Registration SLN: 22095

Course Description

“Big Data,” “The Internet of Things,” “Behavioral Advertising,” “Analytics” — all buzzwords capturing the explosion of data and the promise of what we can do with data. Collecting, using, organizing, and sharing data and information also evokes legal issues and individual and collective uncertainty over who owns this data, what rights does one own, how does the data usage implicate privacy issues, how is and how should data use be regulated by the government, by private entities, for advertising, etc. This course will explore the legal issues associated with data usage, data collection, sharing of user information, and licensing. This course will pay particular attention to privacy laws in the United States, how the FTC and other regulators are approaching advertisers’ use of personal information, how organizations attempt to keep data secure, and how intellectual property rights protect (and do not protect) data and databases.

Meets Law & Ethics Requirement.

Kraig Baker’s humorous and comprehensive lecturing style, complete with the latest trend examples, helped me demystify the law and make it less of a “black box.” I gained a framework to assess and manage legal, ethical, and structural risks, tools to determine if I had a legal issue and insights on whether I needed a lawyer and how to communicate these legal issues effectively.—Aster Li, MCDM alum cohort ‘22 alumni

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COMMLD 530A: Storytelling with Data

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

MCDM Elective | 5 Credits
Thursdays 1/8 – 3/12, 6:00pm – 9:50pm | Room on Time Schedule
Registration SLN: 12649

Course Description:

This course teaches students to assemble visual evidence in service of a narrative story. It reflects the new reality that information graphics, maps, and data visualizations are no longer a supplement to text stories created by dedicated service desks, but are free-standing items produced by cross-disciplinary journalists with skills in data reporting and visual presentation.

This course leads students through the process of reporting, analyzing, and presenting a data-driven infographic feature story. Students will explore the gamut of influential and impactful visual stories: an explainer on Covid-19 transmission (the Washington Post’s most popular story of all time); articles exploring California wildfires and street protests in Hong Kong; and stories exploring larger historical and cultural themes like the rise of Confederate statues and such cultural questions as: why are women’s pants pockets so small and K-pop bands so big?

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COMMLD 580A: Communicating the Future with Scenario Planning

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

MCDM Elective | 5 Credits
Thursdays, 1/8 – 3/12, 6:00pm – 9:50pm | Room on Time Schedule
Registration SLN: 12663

Course Description

This course exposes learners to the strategic storytelling techniques that businesses, governments and non not-for-profits use to explore possible futures. 

Scenarios provide organizations the tools they need to anticipate and navigate the future by developing multiple paths along which the future might unfold. Rather than looking at the world through the lens of what we know, scenario planning starts with uncertainties: Social, technological, economic, environmental and political forces that will evolve over the next several years in unknowable ways. This helps organizations prepare for many eventualities (some which they may not like) because they will be able to see opportunities, mitigate risks, and work toward enabling futures that align with their missions and values.

The course will teach learners how to develop scenarios, how to use them within organizations for strategy and storytelling. Each student will choose an area of interest as an overlay atop a generalized set of futures so they personally understand the power of starting a story with “I don’t know” and using that as a lever to co-create plausible futures that could be. Students will leave the course as scenario planning practitioners, a valuable skill for any leader in an uncertain world.

For more information: Scenario Planning and Communications: How Does Scenario Planning Apply to Communications Jobs?

I went into Scenario Planning as a marketer and left as a strategic storyteller. Dan taught us to look into the future and fashion a whole story out of it, in scenarios and contexts I otherwise wouldn’t have imagined. It also trains you to think of the future beyond just a linear eventuality to help prepare for it in the best way possible. Personally, the application of what I learned was beyond a business context, and I can say this – it helped all of us look at everything in a more multi-dimensional manner.—Matthew Joseph, MCDM cohort ‘22 alumni

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COMMLD 570B: Stakeholder Mindset & Communication

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

Open Elective | 3 Credits
Thursdays, 1/8 – 3/12, 6:00pm – 8:20pm | Room on Time Schedule
Registration SLN: 12662

Course Description:

In August 2019, the Business Roundtable, a group of 181 CEOs from the largest corporations in the world, created, signed, and distributed  a formal document, “Statement on the Purpose of a Corporation.” This communication stated that this group was committed to leading their companies for the benefit of all stakeholders — shareholders, communities, employees, suppliers, and customers. 

In this course, we’ll examine this diverse set of stakeholders and take a closer look at how they interact with corporate leaders and each other internally and externally. What role will marketing communication professionals have in making companies’ messaging more stakeholder focused and inclusive going forward? 

From Elon Musk’s Twitter takeover to the mercurial work policies at Amazon, we’ll examine why companies which do not support stakeholder theory risk losing value. And why the ones that do gain it.

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COMMLD 541B: Crisis Communication

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

Open Elective | Meets Law and Ethics Requirement | 5 Credits
Tuesdays, 1/6 – 3/10, 6:00pm – 9:50pm | Room on Time Schedule
Registration SLN: 12654

Course Description

Crisis communications is about much more than “spin.”  Crises will happen – in government, in the corporate sector, in nonprofits and political campaigns.  What will differentiate you as a communicator is your ability to plan for it, navigate it in real time, and learn something from it.  There is opportunity in crisis.  A crisis forces us to look inside ourselves, at our policies, at our practices, and at how we do our business.

Of course, crisis communications has always been tough; social media and the advent of generative AI have just made it tougher.  We will navigate the latest cultural challenges, from “cancel culture” to messaging in our polarized society.  In this course, we will look at before the crisis (including planning), how we respond during the crisis (this includes the critical crisis communications plan) and after (this is where we cover actions one must take afterwards, including how to repair the damage done).  The class is designed to look at crises in various sectors and will include participation from professionals in the field.

Meets Law and Ethics Requirement.

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COMMLD 540C/D: Public Speaking & Presenting with Impact

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

Open Elective | 2 or 3 Credits
Wednesdays, 1/7 – 3/11, 6:00pm – 7:50pm | Room on Time Schedule
2-credit 540C Registration SLN: 22027
3-credit 540D Registration SLN: 22028

Course Description

Skilled presenters have the power to move people and inspire change. Becoming a more effective and dynamic public speaker means making the complex accessible, connecting the dots for your audience, and developing confidence over canned answers.  By using storytelling and other communications strategies to become a better presenter, you’ll resonate with your audience in new and more meaningful ways.

In this course, you’ll learn how to grab attention immediately, the importance of simplifying your visuals, and why it’s critical to know your message well enough to speak directly to your audience — not to your notes and not to your screen.  We’ll address the mistakes most people make, and how to avoid them to ensure that you’re communicating with poise, confidence and conviction in a way that captivates your audience.

Whether it’s over Zoom or winning over the room, by mastering your public speaking skills you will learn to overcome doubt, increase your confidence and find your voice.

Note: 540C is the 2 credit version; 540D is the 3 credit version. The 3-credit version will include additional presentation assignments and deliverables.

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COMMLD 533: Storytelling for Emergent Platforms

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

MCDM Elective | 5 Credits
Saturdays 1/10, 1/24, 2/7, 2/21, 3/7 | Room on Time Schedule
Registration SLN: 22265

Course Description

Emerging models of interactive and immersive storytelling are disrupting how we reach and engage with audiences. In this course we will examine the unique ways that media and user-generated content can tell one cohesive story across platforms in a distributed way; and how this is a pivotal part of the current and future Web 3.0 ecosystem. We will focus our design thinking on audience engagement, UX, built worlds for interactive experiences, and the role of AI as a tool, an assistant, and a platform– students will learn about best-practice uses of VR/AR, branch narratives, game development and integration of traditional video in mobile UX.  We will be coupling a critical look at these emerging models while working through the technical aspects of story creation and the implementation of media production tools and platforms. 

This will be a project-based course through which students will acquire the strategy and skills to make informed design decisions, develop and use of immersive storytelling processes. Previous media production, web development or game design is not necessary, though a willingness to learn and play with the underlying technologies is a must.

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COMMLD 532: Advanced Video Storytelling

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

MCDM Elective | 5 Credits
Saturdays 1/17, 1/31, 2/14, 2/28, 3/14, 9:00am – 5:00pm | Room on Time Schedule
Registration SLN: 12651

Course Description

The world of video production is a mysterious and ambiguous place consisting of freelancers, business owners, and in-house roles. In this course students will learn how to add structure to their client interactions, how to ensure that they’re delivering content that fits their client’s needs, and how to navigate studio-based filming environments. Class will consist of qualitative analysis of how to approach storytelling problems as well as hands-on experiences with advanced camera gear in a professional setting. Students will collaborate in teams throughout the quarter to create one short video for a real-world client.

This course is a good match for students who:

• Have taken the Foundations of Video Storytelling course OR have a very strong understanding of how to create video content

• Are open to a simulated real world experience which includes working in groups

• Are prepared for a time consuming and rigorous learning experience

Students must prove their proficiency in video production to register for this course by meeting the minimum qualifications:

1. Proficient experience in editing video on the following platforms: Adobe Premiere, Final Cut Pro, and/or DaVinci Resolve.

2. Experience in shooting video with either DSLRs or Video Cinema Cameras.

Please fill the form below to the best of your ability. You may be reached out with further clarifications. If your form is approved, you will receive an add code to register for the course. (Note: applications will be time stamped, and qualified applicants will be added to remaining class spots on an equitable basis determined by time of application and remaining time in the program.

The application will go live on Monday, November 3rd at 5:45 AM: https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=W9229i_wGkSZoBYqxQYL0gQXiIHyAPFBsf0wd7UK0I5UOE01MDFENUpSUjI4WjBJQllNMjhNTVY4VC4u

Here are the questions on the form to help you prepare before it goes live:

Full Name
UW Email

Have you taken (or are currently taking) COMMLD 531: Foundations of Video Storytelling?

If you have not taken the Foundations of Video Storytelling course, do you have other comparable experience? We do not cover basics of how to use gear or software in this class, we focus largely on client relations and storytelling principles so you need to have a solid foundation of video creation methods in order to succeed. Please provide examples of your work if applicable.

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COMMLD 530B: Foundation of Documentary Storytelling

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

Open Elective | 5 Credits
Wednesdays, 1/7 – 3/11, 6:00pm – 9:50pm | Room on Time Schedule
Registration SLN: 22026

Course Description

Foundations of Documentary Storytelling is a workshop-based course where students get hands-on experience in building documentary stories from start to finish. This course supports and cultivates curiosity-driven mindset and the technical skill development needed to produce compelling documentary media for innovative marketing and media production. How do you take a compelling topic and make it an engaging story? Documentary Storytelling will teach you to take stories, characters and themes and craft them into stories by breaking chronology, building emotional resonance and cultivating buy-in so that we want to know what happens and get invested in the outcome. 

You will learn to craft character-driven nonfiction narratives while mastering the complete production process: research, story craft, video/audio styles and equipment use, field recording and interview techniques, film editing and constructing feedback. This course looks at both technical proficiency and ethical responsibility in documentary as well as exploring production roles, documentary industry standards, and the power dynamics inherent in capturing others’ stories. 

Students will create multiple documentary productions with various crew structures and independent work which will be paired with guest speaker workshops and film case studies from award-winning professional documentarians. You will leave the class with a strong understanding of what is required throughout a production process through holding a variety of production roles. Get ready to deep dive on building stories from the world around you and explore how documentary techniques can transform your skills and repertoire as a communications leader.

This Course is Ideal for Students Who:

Aspire to integrate relational storytelling methods into their communication leadership practice

Seek project-based learning experience

Want to develop transferable core storytelling and editing skills 

Are interested in understanding how documentary can successfully shift culture, policy and public opinion through storytelling

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COMMLD 521: Digital Media Branding & Marketing

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

MCDM Elective | 5 Credits
Wednesdays, 1/7 – 3/11, 6:00pm – 9:50pm | Online
Registration SLN: 12648

Course Description

This course is designed for students who will be utilizing their education and experience in the marketing career tracks or in leadership functions where an understanding of marketing is critical. The focus of the course will be on how to build a brand online or extend a legacy brand digitally by applying marketing fundamentals and examining how the most interesting and dynamic brands operate today. We will simulate brand management and building campaigns for real-world brands and explore how they reach target customers to meet objectives and participate in online culture. While online platforms have offered us many more opportunities and “shiny objects” to reach and communicate with customers, the fundamental marketing skills and theories don’t change much or quickly. Learning to be strategic about how to apply these fundamentals will allow students to remain flexible and relevant.

This class is a good match for students who:

• want to build expansive, omni-channel marketing strategies and tactics for brand building

• want to develop a CMO view of brand management and building marketing capabilities

• want to learn to create a portfolio-level brand plan

Honestly, this class felt like years of experience packed in ten weeks. As someone who has worked with marketers but has never taken any marketing courses before this one, my perception of branding and digital marketing evolved constantly week by week. Having theoretical and practical experience throughout this course truly gave me a well-rounded experience. —previous student, Digital Media Branding & Marketing

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COMMLD 520C: Market Research Approaches in the Age of AI

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

MCDM Elective | Meets Research Methods Requirement | 5 Credits
Tuesdays, 1/6 – 3/10, 6:00pm – 9:50pm | Room on Time Schedule
Registration SLN: 12647

Course Description

Marketers are blind without research. From learning unmet needs, to shaping solutions, to setting prices and optimizing creatives, input from customers is how you go from good to great. The aim of this course is not to teach you sampling, statistics, and analytics, but rather to be an expert in knowing what research to resource when, what quality looks like, and how to persuade change. 

The instructors are two client-side researchers at Microsoft who do just that. Plan to learn about 20 different research approaches that the global market-research industry has grown to answer the most common questions, and that most marketers “buy rather than build.”  Know when to ask for an ethnography, a pricing model, a journey study, or a campaign effectiveness study, among many others, and to know what makes them good, what “money slides” each produces, and the typical moves in persuading change with the results. Get your hands dirty in class with all the work needed to do research other than the math (making stimuli, writing survey questions, designing logical paths, and visualizing data with the best art and storytelling) and explore with us how AI can speed up and streamline much of it. We will build the class around a hypothetical tech product “an AI privacy defender” and by the end of the class, we’ll know what research to ask our VC to fund to bring it to market. 

This class is a good match for students who:

• Know some fundamentals of marketing

• Want to create a pitch deck for venture capital funding of an incubation tech product

• Have little desire to do math, but want to wield its power

Meets Research Methods Requirement.

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COMMLD 520A: Principles of Marketing

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

Open Elective | 5 Credits
Mondays, 1/5 – 3/9, 6:00pm – 9:50pm | Room on Time Schedule
Registration SLN: 12645

Course Description

This course provides a foundational understanding of marketing principles and their application within business, nonprofit, and public-sector organizations. Students will learn through the lens of integrated marketing, a key skill in today’s marketing landscape. Our focus will be on understanding the key elements of a marketing strategy, including goal setting, audience identification, planning, and landscape analysis. Students will learn practical and commonly-used tools like SWOT analyses, stakeholder maps, brand positioning exercises, and messaging frameworks. 

Building on this foundation, the course will also explore elements of brand and behavior change marketing, with real-world applications in areas such as public health, sustainability, and social impact. Students will complete the course with increased confidence in designing and executing strategies that work across public relations, creative, digital, and operational functions in complex organizations.

Through lectures, case studies, guest speakers, in-class activities, and group projects, students will connect theory with practice, based on their areas of interest and expertise. Students will develop portfolio-level plans to support their career goals. This class is a fit for students who plan to pursue more advanced coursework, and those with an interest in marketing, communications, public affairs, or brand strategy careers where cross-functional collaboration is essential.

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COMMLD 515: Advanced User Design: Generative AI Studio

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

MCDM Elective | Meets Research Methods Requirement | 5 Credits
Wednesdays, 1/7 – 3/11, 6:00pm – 9:50pm | Room on Time Schedule
Registration SLN: 12644

Course Description

In the Generative AI UX Studio course, students dive into the dynamic intersection of traditional experience design and artificial intelligence, mastering the tools and frameworks that are reshaping how humans interact with technology. Through intensive hands-on projects, students craft intelligent, adaptive experiences that push beyond conventional interfaces, learning to orchestrate seamless interactions between users and AI agents while maintaining essential human-centered design principles. Students develop expertise in the emerging field of agentic design, creating sophisticated agent personas and behavioral frameworks that define how AI systems perceive, reason, and act on behalf of users – skills that are increasingly crucial in modern digital product development.

Working in collaborative teams that mirror industry practice, students navigate the complex interplay between design, AI capabilities, and user trust, developing working prototypes that demonstrate real-world application of these advanced concepts. Upon completion, students emerge with compelling portfolio pieces that showcase their ability to design next-generation experiences where AI enhances rather than replaces human interaction, positioning them as leaders in this transformative wave of UX innovation.

Meets Research Methods Requirement.

Course Prerequisites: COMMLD 511, 512, or 517.

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COMMLD 512: User Research & UX Strategies

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- 2025-2026 | Winter 2026

MCDM Elective | Meets Research Methods Requirement | 5 Credits
Thursdays, 1/8 – 3/12, 6:00pm – 9:50pm | Online
Registration SLN: 12643

Course Description:

This course focuses on the design, implementation, and evaluation of user interfaces from a usability perspective. The aim of the class is to study the concepts, methods, and techniques of usability engineering, with a focus on the artifacts where user experience is essential. Historically, usability has covered aspects of efficiency, learnability, and ease of use. Today, a large number of other measures for success rely on elements such as playability, engagement, entertainment, immersion, and aesthetics.

The above concepts will be detailed with the expectation that by the end of the quarter, students will recognize the aspects of each of the following deliverables within Interface Design and User Research. At the completion of this course, students will have portfolio-ready, end-to-end work examples. The work examples are designed for students to demonstrate they can: understand basic principles of user interface design, implementation, and evaluation, design and conduct usability studies, select an appropriate evaluation method and articulate its advantages and disadvantages, establish useful test objectives, and prepare reports and presenting results.

Meets Research Methods Requirement.

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© Copyright 2025 Department of Communication. University of Washington

© Copyright 2025 Department of Communication. University of Washington