Classes

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.

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COMMLD 570 D: Online Community Data Research

(

Hansen

)

- Current Quarter | 2024-2025 | Spring 2025

Track Neutral | Meets Research Methods Requirement | 5 Credits
Mondays 3/31 – 6/9, 6:00pm – 9:50pm | CMU 230
SLN: 12593

Course Description

Navigating online communities constitutes a large portion of what we experience as “the internet,” and yet understanding these communities is not always a straightforward or easy task. This course will explore the nature of online communities, different ways we can come to learn about them, and how we should think about handling the data we collect (and indeed, whether to collect it at all). Students will gain a basic social scientific foundation for thinking about communities and the affordances of computer mediated communication before surveying several established approaches to collecting and analyzing data produced by and about specific communities, including surveys, web scraping, and social listening/monitoring. 

Throughout, we will consider the ethical implications and demands of our work as researchers and professionals, emphasizing such values as respect for persons, prevention of harm, and beneficence. Students will conclude the course by developing group research projects using one or more of the methods we’ve learned together to answer a clearly defined research question and presenting their findings within a professional context.

Meets Research Methods Requirement.

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COMMLD 573: Listening and Leadership for Participatory Design Skills

(

Crofts

)

- Current Quarter | 2024-2025 | Spring 2025

Track Neutral | 2 Credits
Wednesdays 4/2 – 6/4, 6:00pm – 7:50pm | Online
SLN: 12594

Course Description:

While there are many skills that contribute to being an effective leader at any level of any organization, you would be hard-pressed to find a list that didn’t include listening up at the top. Across the field of professional communication, teams collaborate to design things every day—from a strategic communications plan to a new app. Participatory design centers the voices of end-users in the design process, with a goal to create products or services that thereby better meet the priorities of the user by listening carefully to their insights, observations, and feedback. (Other terms for participatory design include cooperative design, co-design, or community design.) One could argue that strong leadership and strong participatory design share a common feature when it comes to listening: both your colleagues and your clients thrive when you actively listen and learn from them.

This class takes an applied approach to listening skill development by inviting students to become keen observers of their listening habits, as well as active participants in strengthening this crucial skill set. We will explore listening as it relates to participatory design, from UX research to community development, and from listening across differences on diverse teams to advocacy movements.

Throughout the quarter, we were able to learn about various listening styles and how we can apply them in our personal and professional lives. To this day, I still reference the material and course reading that we learned and reviewed in class.–AK Sterling, MCCN cohort ‘19 alumni

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COMMLD 580 B: Content Design for Conversational AI

(

Bradshaw

)

- Current Quarter | 2024-2025 | Spring 2025

MCDM Elective | 5 Credits
Wednesdays 4/2 – 6/4, 6:00pm – 9:50pm | CMU 126
SLN: 21712

Course Description

Conversational AI has significantly reshaped human interactions, impacting how we connect, purchase, work, learn, and live our lives in the 21st century. This course delves into Conversational AI, exploring its intricate relationship with communication and media theory. Students will delve into the intricate interplay between human interaction and AI, including the foundational groundwork required for constructing dialogues, and explore generative AI’s potential and limitations. By immersing ourselves in critical questions such as the necessity of bots and avatars, and their roles in mimicking human discourse, we embark on a journey to uncover the underlying motives.

We will focus on real-world case studies from business and education, enabling us to paint a holistic portrait of the vast Conversational AI landscape. In your final project, your team will present a prototype for a conversational AI solution for an existing company or new product.

Professor Bradshaw’s Content Design for Conversational AI class came at the perfect time in my career. The hands-on experience enabled me to transform our agency’s workflow with custom GPTs and other bleeding-edge AI tools, sparking rich discussions with my mentor about AI’s potential in our industry. When she later co-founded an AI-focused agency, the strategic understanding and technical confidence I gained in this class, combined with our years of trusted professional collaboration, made me the natural choice for Director of Content Strategy. The course’s practical approach continues to shape how we help clients create more personalized, engaging content experiences at scale.— Jakob Picciotto, MCDM Student

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COMMLD 591: Independent Research

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- Current Quarter | 2024-2025 | Spring 2025 | Summer 2025

Track Neutral | 1-5 Credits
Application Required

Course Description:

Independent Research projects are student-driven, with faculty serving in a loose advisory capacity. This option is for students with a clear project in mind who will only need minimal faculty support to accomplish their end goal. See complete details and application instructions on the Guide to Independent Research page.

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COMMLD 593: Internship

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)

- Current Quarter | 2024-2025 | Spring 2025 | Summer 2025 | Winter 2025

Track Neutral | 1-5 Credits
Application Required

Course Description:

An internship can be a useful way to give students a fundamental understanding of the industry and to accelerate one’s career path. Internships should be directly relevant to the student’s field of study (degree or specialization). Part-time jobs not related to the degree will normally not be approved for internship credit, as the purpose of an internship is to apply what you have been learning in your degree to a real world work experience. See complete details and application instructions on the Guide to Internships page.

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COMMLD 600: MC Research Project

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- Current Quarter | 2024-2025 | Spring 2025 | Summer 2025 | Winter 2025

Track Neutral | 5 Credits
Application Required

Course Description:

After completion of a minimum of 50% of Comm Lead course work, students can choose to conduct a scholarly research project. An MC Research Project is roughly the equivalent of a master’s thesis in scope and rigor, and requires the student form a committee of at least two faculty members to evaluate the work, as well as give a public presentation of the final deliverable. See complete details and application instructions on the Guide to MC Research Project page.

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