The Program in Media Studies – Goals and Outcomes Assessment
The aim of CUA's Program in Media Studies is to provide students with tools to analyze mass media critically. An interdisciplinary field, media studies at Catholic is rooted in traditions of rhetorical and historical criticism across the humanities. Core courses promote understanding of film, television, and other media in their varied aesthetic, social, historical and cultural contexts. After completing the core, majors choose electives that may emphasize media criticism and/or emphasize techniques of media composition and production. Majors in the program also have opportunities to gain professional experience through internships. As part of its liberal arts commitment, the media studies curriculum emphasizes writing and critical thinking, and it requires all students to take at least one media production course, so that students experience the role of the critic from the opposite side of the table. The Program thus engages students as both critics and creators; they learn how to read cultural texts critically, and how to produce their own media intelligently. Students develop a relationship to mass media that is aware and socially responsible, one that prepares them for a wide variety of careers in fields as diverse as film and video, broadcasting, journalism, public relations, advertising, law, or teaching and scholarship in the humanities.
All Media Studies majors must fulfill the Senior Assessment requirement. The Senior Assessment involves (1) Completion of MDIA 499 with a grade of C- or better; and (2) Completion of the Media Studies comprehensive exam with a grade of "Pass" or "High Pass." These two components are described below.
(1) MDIA 499 is the Senior Seminar, which must be taken in the fall of a student's senior year. The Senior Seminar requires each student to design her or his own question and produce a research paper while engaged in the intellectual exchange of an advanced seminar on a specific topic in Media Studies. (Students are stepped-up to this course by taking MDIA 304 seminar in either their sophomore or junior year.)
(2) The Media Studies Comprehensive exam is a three-hour written test administered at the beginning of the spring semester. The exam consists of three parts designed and graded by a faculty panel. The parts are as follows:
Part I. Essay.
Students are asked to write an essay on a media text that is shown to them at the exam. The question will be distributed, and students are shown a brief film, video, or TV clip to analyze in answer to that question.
Part II. Vocabulary.
Students are tested on a core vocabulary of Media Studies terms. They may select either a core vocabulary that is weighted toward critical studies or one that is weighted toward production studies, depending upon their history in the major. Both lists (sans definitions) are available before hand.
Part III. Essay.
Students are asked to write an essay on a critical text that they study on their own. They are given a choice of two recent books in the field and asked to prepare to write about one on their own. They may discuss the texts with their peers before the exam, and they may bring a copy to the exam. The specific essay questions are distributed at the exam.
The Senior Assessment requirement in media studies evaluates student preparation and learning experience at a number of complimentary levels. The senior seminar develops and ultimately displays their writing and research skills while additionally asking students to demonstrate their abilities as interlocutors, both as participants in an advanced-level discussion of a specific topic and as the designers of individual research projects that address questions in the field. The comprehensive exam tests analytic skills at the level of primary texts (Part One) and at the level of secondary literature (Part Two). Students must interpret an exemplary media text, and they must demonstrate that they can understand and evaluate an extended scholarly argument about media texts. The vocabulary portion of the test (Part Three) additionally evaluates the conceptual resources and subject area knowledge that they have achieved.
Lisa Gitelman
September 2004
