> Courses > 2021-2022

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.

COMMLD 551: The Laws and Ethics of Organizations

(

Tausch Lapora

)

- 2021-2022 | Spring 2022

MCCN Elective | Meets Law & Ethics Requirement | 5 Credits
Tuesdays 3/29 – 5/31 6:00PM – 9:50PM | CMU 126 | Partially In-Person
Registration SLN: 12609

Course Description

All organizations — private, public and nonprofit — inevitably encounter legal and ethical challenges when building and engaging with their communities and networks. Leaders must be able to identify, anticipate, and problem solve how to legally and ethically create, grow, and maintain organizations. This course considers and juxtaposes the legal and ethical realities of community building through a cross-sector approach, particularly by utilizing racial equity and anti-oppression frameworks and grounding in behavioral ethics (decision-making and heuristics). We will survey a wide array of case studies, many with a social justice backdrop, in which law and ethics may overlap, conflict, or contain gaps. We will engage in simulations, real-world scenarios and games to maximize understanding of the impact of law and ethics on organizational communications to clients, customers and constituencies. Throughout the course, you are encouraged to bring in legal and ethical issues from your professional experiences to enrich discussion of course topics. No prior experience in law is required.

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COMMLD 544: Professional Short-Form Writing

(

Tomasic

)

- 2021-2022 | Spring 2022

Track Neutral | Meets Professional Writing Requirement | 3 Credits
Wednesdays 3/30 – 6/1 6:00PM – 8:20PM | CMU 230 | Partially In-Person
Registration SLN: 21578

Course Description

This collaborative hands-on course explores the kind of short-form writing that dominates today’s rapidly evolving professional communications space — the digital space where lines between content and form increasingly blur and where always-on media feeds deliver a mix of advertising, marketing, public relations, human resources, personal brand-building and journalistic reporting and research. It’s a space that presents new writing challenges every day: professional emails, office memos, newsletters, website copy, funding proposals, executive summaries, op-eds, tweets, blurbs, blogs. Much of this material is badly done. Most of it is mediocre. The best of it, though, sings out and demands our attention, demonstrating mastery in the kind of critical thinking and dedicated practice that delivers copy sharply focused and sure in matching voice and material with form and audience. This course is part professional-communications criticism class and part writing workshop. It’s about learning how to identify good writing; it’s about understanding the process that produces good writing; and it’s about practicing that process yourself.

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COMMLD 540: The Power of Revision

(

Baltus

)

- 2021-2022 | Spring 2022

Track Neutral | Meets Professional Writing Requirement | 3 Credits
Tuesdays 3/29 – 5/31 6:00PM – 8:20PM | CMU 242 | Partially In-Person
Registration SLN: 12608

Course Description:

No matter what kind of writing you do, editing skills are essential to producing your best work. In this course, experienced writers will learn a rigorous, methodical approach to revision that transforms a rough draft into a compelling finished piece. You’ll gain the awareness and control you need to diagnose and address problems, develop ideas and themes, create structure, and craft a story. You’ll also hone your ability at the line level, learning ways to make your writing clearer and more precise by eliminating clichés, clunky phrases, and extraneous words. As an editing workshop, this course emphasizes the importance of giving and receiving kind, productive feedback. It focuses on longer-form texts for public audiences, such as blog posts, executive op-eds, and news releases, though its principles are applicable to all forms of writing and creative iteration.

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COMMLD 534: Visual Storytelling: From Comics to Transmedia

(

Salkowitz

)

- 2021-2022 | Spring 2022

MCDM Elective | 5 Credits
Saturdays 4/2, 4/16, 4/30, 5/14, 6/4 9:00AM – 5:00PM | CMU 126 | In Person
Registration SLN: 21479

Course Description

This course will provide you with a solid understanding of the medium of sequential art and visual narrative (aka “comics”) and the practical ability to incorporate visual storytelling into traditional, digital, and transmedia projects in a variety of entertainment, business, education, social and journalistic scenarios. Why comics? Comics and sequential art have gone from the margins of popular culture to the center of a multi-billion dollar global industry and a respected art-form. Many of the most popular movies, television, video games and transmedia projects are adapted from comics and/or depend heavily on storytelling styles that originated with this unique medium. Issues of digital distribution, adaptation and audience engagement that arise in today’s “comics culture” affect the future of publishing, technology, social media and gaming. Beyond the world of entertainment, the principles of visual narrative are becoming fundamental to all manner of storytelling projects, global initiatives and creative enterprises. This class will explore the history and potential of comics as a storytelling medium in the digital age in both media studies and business dimension, incorporating both theory and practice.

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COMMLD 532: Advanced Video Storytelling

(

Chan

)

- 2021-2022 | Spring 2022

MCDM Elective | 5 Credits
Wednesdays 3/30 – 6/1 6:00PM – 9:50PM | CMU 126 | Partially In-Person
Registration SLN: 21478 (application required)

Course Description

Today, the technology that surrounds the “tell” of a story (the modes and channels of communication) directly shape the immersive experience felt by the viewer, while leveraging the lessons of narrative and myth. This course focuses on the decisions we make when we tell our stories. This course is both theoretical and practical. Students will be afforded the skills to create and distribute video stories. Additionally, students will be expected to display critical thinking around point of view, audience targeting, ROI success criteria, methodology, and production standards. Students are expected to exercise the craft of content creation while at the same time critically evaluating and deconstructing content they see in the marketplace.

*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 this form 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.

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COMMLD 530A: Advanced Podcasting

(

Partnow

)

- 2021-2022 | Spring 2022

Track Neutral | 5 Credits
Wednesdays 3/30 – 6/1 6:00PM – 9:50PM | CMU 302 | Partially In-Person
Registration SLN: 12606 (application required)

Course Description

This is a project-centered class for students with audio storytelling skills. Class time will focus on story/project development, visits with guest speakers, and skill building geared towards designing and implementing a large audio story project, such as a new podcast, audio mini series, or audio-driven multimedia project. Students will consider target audience and create an audience engagement plan, develop an editorial mission and focus, explore funding options and production needs, create an outline of the full project or first season of a new podcast, and produce an initial pilot episode. Students should come to the class comfortable with recording and editing audio. COMMLD 535: Foundations of Audio Storytelling or equivalent experience in nonfiction audio or video storytelling required.

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

1. Proficient experience in editing audio or video programs

Please fill this form 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.

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COMMLD 525: Brand Values and Creativity

(

Howard

)

- 2021-2022 | Spring 2022

Track Neutral | 5 Credits
Tuesdays 3/29 – 5/31 6:00PM – 9:50PM | DEN 213 | Partially In-Person
Registration SLN: 12605

Course Description

This course will take a close up look at corporate brand values in marketing communications today. Brand values should be timeless and unchanging, but in a constantly fluctuating business environment, is this goal even possible? While high volume video advertising and A/B testing is exploding, paradoxically, messaging of corporate brand values is oftentimes minimized. Marketing today is composed of ever-changing algorithms, transactional communications, and confusing narratives.Should creativity play a bigger role in storytelling in today’s marketplace? Do customers even know what the companies they make purchases from actually stand for values-wise? Does it matter? How can companies still connect emotionally with consumers? Students will ideate a marketing film for a company or nonprofit of their choice. All the while, they’ll be considering deeply how emotion, story, and marketing message function in a project that resonates with the consumer while also reinforcing an organization’s belief system.

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COMMLD 523: Foundations of Branding: Social Media Communications and Strategy

(

Tang

)

- 2021-2022 | Spring 2022

MCDM Elective | 5 Credits
Saturdays 4/9, 4/23, 5/7, 5/21, 6/4 9:00AM – 5:00PM | Online
Registration SLN: 21453

Course Description

Communication on digital platforms and networks will be the forever norm of our society and human experience. In this course, we will learn, practice and investigate the fundamental principles of communication through digital platforms such as social media. We’ll identify strategies used by social media platforms to maximize their key metrics and apply them to business metrics that brands and organizations use to fulfill their objectives and goals. At the end of this course, you’ll be able to identify areas of opportunity on social media platforms to create interesting campaigns, analyze emerging social trends to stay ahead of the curve, and use the tools and best practices of the world’s most powerful brands to engage audiences.

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COMMLD 513: Content Marketing

(

Weaver

)

- 2021-2022 | Spring 2022

MCCN Elective | Meets Research Methods Requirement | 5 Credits
Saturdays 4/2, 4/16, 4/30, 5/14, 5/28, 9:00AM – 5:00PM | Online
Registration SLN: 12604

Course Description

This course focuses on the approach and implementation of marketing programs that encourage community building and engagement. Content marketing is a special kind of content that you can use to build relationships with audiences, drawing new audiences or rewarding loyal fans. Our focus will be on how to give freely of our knowledge. We will explore a research-backed method for how to make content that educates and supports audiences, that complements advertising, mission-driven, or task-based content.

To do so, we will learn the basics of a content strategy process. Our 6 part data-driven methodology includes working with secondary research: stakeholder goals and audiences. Conducting our own primary research in comparative and content review. Building from research, we’ll explore best practices and tactics for messaging, content planning, and delivering strategy concepts to clients or coworkers. Our final product focuses on building brand storytelling, effective messaging, and planning adaptable content for multichannel (physical or digital) environments. Final materials can be useful for portfolios.

Meets Research Methods Requirement.

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COMMLD 512: User Research and UX Strategies

(

Levine

)

- 2021-2022 | Spring 2022

MCDM Elective | Meets Research Methods Requirement | 5 Credits
Mondays 3/28 – 6/6, 6:00PM – 9:50PM | DEN 258 | Partially In-Person
Registration SLN: 21452

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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COMMLD 502: Narratives and Networks

(

Yasin

)

- 2021-2022 | Spring 2022

Track Neutral | Core Requirement | 3 Credits
Thursdays 3/31 – 6/2, 6:00PM – 8:20PM | PCAR 192 | Hybrid
Registration SLN: 12603

Course Description

Introduces students to key discussions on communication and organizational narratives facilitated by digital media and emerging technologies and explores methods of creating powerful communication networked tools for organizations. At the end of the quarter students create their own communication projects. Credit/no-credit only.

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COMMLD 520: Qualitative Research for Social Media Marketing

(

Kubler

)

- 2021-2022 | Winter 2022

Track Neutral Elective | Meets Research Methods Requirement | 5 credits
Tuesdays 1/4 – 3/8, 6:00PM – 9:50PM PST | CMU 302 | Registration SLN: 22234 | In-Person

Course Description:

From selling the newest runway fashions to promoting donations to Greenpeace, successful online marketing campaigns and product launches often start with well planned qualitative research. This course offers a qualitative methodological perspective on how to conduct interviews and focus groups. This course explains the who, what, why and how of qualitative research with practical applications for those professionally interested in marketing, branding, and even user experience as well. Students will work throughout the quarter to design and implement their own qualitative research project.

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COMMLD 531: Foundations of Video Storytelling

(

Christensen

)

- 2021-2022 | Winter 2022

MCDM Elective | 5 Credits
Thursdays 1/6, 1/20, 1/27, 2/3, 2/10, 2/17, 3/3, 3/10, 6:00PM – 9:50PM PST; One Saturday session 1/15 9:00AM – 5:00PM | CMU 302 | Hybrid
Registration SLN: 22123

Course Description

The landscape of web-distributed video can be broadly divided into two motifs: Entertainment and Information. From YouTube to Facebook, AR to VR, Twitch to Facebook Live, online video is a storytelling revolution.

Storytelling has been part of the human experience since the formation of language. Today, the technology that surrounds the “tell” of a story (the modes and channels of communication) directly shapes the immersive experience felt by the viewer.

This course focuses on the decisions we make when we tell our stories. This course is both theoretical and practical. Students will be afforded the skills to create and distribute video stories. Additionally, students will be expected to display critical thinking around point of view, audience targeting, ROI success criteria, methodology, and production standards. You are expected to exercise the craft of content creation while at the same time critically evaluating and deconstructing content you see in the marketplace.

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COMMLD 570 B: Building Brands with Communication & Community

(

Kim

)

- 2021-2022 | Winter 2022

Track Neutral Elective | 3 Credits
Wednesdays 1/5 – 3/9, 6:00PM – 8:20PM PST | CMU 242 | Hybrid
Registration SLN: 22124

Course Description

Community partnerships are not effective if communication and storytelling surrounding them are not strategic. This course will explore how partnerships and collaborations with like-minded brands or orgs, along with the communication strategy around them, grows your audience while furthering your mission. This course looks at how the right partnerships help tell your story while deepening your relationship to your audience, the partner brand and others. This will include looking at both business partnerships (ones that further brand awareness, customer growth and sales) as well as social impact partnerships (ones that further customer loyalty, through things like givebacks, impact programs and public service). Lastly this course will also look at using your mission to create community impact programs and how to build powerful campaigns around them to grow your audience and engagement and create opportunities for others to share your story.

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COMMLD 560 C: Designing Inclusive Workplace Culture

(

Williams

)

- 2021-2022 | Winter 2022

MCCN Elective | 5 Credits
Thursdays 1/6 – 3/10, 6:00PM – 9:50PM | Online
Registration SLN: 22074

Course Description:

Workplace culture is dynamic. It’s not about ping-pong tables and unlimited time off. Inclusive and effective culture is critical to how we design the future of work. How we connect and work together impacts everything from how we feel, to our ability to meet the mission of our work. Communication leaders are uniquely situated to effect positive cultural change, no matter the role or the organization. In this course students will learn the “5 components of Inclusive Culture,” a signature framework developed over 15 years of experience helping organizations, startups, small businesses, and emerging companies build inclusive workplaces. Students will learn and apply this step-by-step methodology to build a culture plan for a company of their choice.

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COMMLD 512: User Research and UX Strategies

(

Porter

)

- 2021-2022 | Winter 2022

MCDM Elective | Meets Research Methods Requirement | 5 Credits
Thursdays 1/6 – 3/10, 6:00PM – 9:50PM | CMU 126 | Hybrid
Registration SLN: 22072

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