Wash U Loves Construction Projects–How About a Journalism Major?

Washington University seems to have it all. It boasts tempurpedic mattresses, high-quality food (at least at Ibby’s), and enough student activities to satisfy the extracurricular cravings of its diverse student body. In addition, the school features over 90 undergraduate majors and fields of study, so that students with interests from finance to French to forensics can take courses in the subjects of their dreams. And with its unending stream of construction projects, Wash U appears to continuously expand and improve its campus. But for a school that likes to build, Wash U has yet to fill a massive hole in its programming: a journalism major.

[pullquote]But for a school that likes to build, Wash U has yet to fill a massive hole in its programming: a journalism major.[/pullquote]

Journalism schools in America are only 100 years old. However, nearly all of the top 20 schools in the United States have journalism and communications (or similar) majors. Some schools, such as Northwestern and Columbia, have gained notoriety for their world-class journalism schools.

While Wash U ranks eighteenth on US News & World Report ’s 2018 Best Colleges list, it has yet to construct a major so prevalent at other elite institutions in the country. It also lacks majors related to journalism, such as communications and writing, though it does offer a writing minor as a consolation prize.

The deficiency is cleverly concealed by a carefully worded “Journalism & Communication” brief on Wash U’s website. The page describes how studying the two disciplines can help students “develop important skills” in a “an intriguing, fast-paced, multidisciplinary field” with a “global influence.” It also includes a section entitled “Journalism and Communications at Washington University” that lists some of the University College classes in the two disciplines. However, the section fails to explicitly note that there is no journalism or communications major at Wash U.

The absence of a journalism major has not been for a lack of trying. Several years ago, the English Department unanimously agreed that the school should offer an option for students to study journalism and decided to create a proposal. It spent five years fashioning and petitioning for a journalism concentration for the English major, parallel to the Creative Writing concentration for the English major.

The proposal suggested that the major consist of twelve classes including five pertaining to journalism. Some of the classes in the proposal were only offered at Wash U’s University College while others were from Arts and Sciences.

The journalism concentration proposal faced immense barriers. Academic ties between journalism and English literature are weak at best, and the concentration relied heavily on University College offerings rather than on journalism courses offered by Arts and Sciences (granted, there are few.) The lack of journalism-trained Arts and Sciences faculty members, coupled with the high cost of the program, made the proposal unattractive to Wash U’s administrators. Ultimately, the proposal failed.

Since then, no new proposals have been created for a journalism major or program. Yet J. Dillon Brown, who is the Director of Undergraduate Studies for the English Department, strongly advocates for the creation of the major. He considers educating journalists to be a “civic duty.” Having been asked about journalism by prospective undergraduate students and full-time Washington University students, Brown has seen significant interest in creating the major.

Kiva Runnels is one of the many students at Wash U hoping to study journalism. Obsessed with NPR—the self-professed “soundtrack” to her life—Runnels wants to become a broadcast journalist.

Runnels did not realize the poverty of journalism options at Wash U until she started college, for if she had, she may have chosen to study elsewhere. Perusing the University College journalism options, she was disappointed to find that the school offers a single broadcast journalism class, taught only online. Runnels is forced to compete for broadcast journalism internships— now the only potential source for her of a broadcast journalism education—against students trained in dedicated journalism classes.

Journalism programs at other schools include some courses which prepare students broadly for the field and others which are catered to each student’s unique interests. For example, at Northwestern University, students can take Philosophy of Modern Journalism alongside computer science courses, immersing themselves in deep journalistic conversations while also learning about the code behind the screen.
Yet for students just hoping for a general journalism education at Wash U, the current journalism offerings—namely student-run activities, University College journalism courses, and a few Arts and Sciences classes— are simply not enough.

In an utter contrast, one of Runnels’s friends, who is a freshman at Mizzou, FaceTimed with one of the editors of Vogue. She has since been promoted to publishing writer at one of their publications, allowing her to make strong connections with leaders in the industry, while Runnels contemplates whether she will even be able to study journalism during her four years at Wash U.

Another campus journalism queen, Ella Chochrek, advocates for the creation of a journalism major at Wash U. Formerly at the helm of Wash. U.’s Student Life newspaper, Chochrek loves to write the articles read by thousands of students, to impact Wash U with the power of words. To Chochrek, who is majoring in International and Area Studies, a journalism major is becoming more important for students now than ever before given the increasingly politicized world.

“Journalism is something that has really become more impactful in this current administration, where we see a lot of threats against journalists that may not have been made in the past,” she said.

Chochrek argues that without proper journalism training, journalistic hopefuls will be unprepared after they graduate for the cutthroat world of “fake news” accusations and deadline writing. More students have opted to enroll in journalism undergraduate and graduate programs now than ever before. Twenty years ago, barely 150,000 students enrolled in journalism and mass communication degree programs; that number has since climbed above 200,000, a testament to the importance of a journalism education.

The benefits of a journalism degree transcend the field—in addition to learning about journalism from renowned faculty and receiving guidance from advisors and fellow students, the training in web editing, photography and videography that often accompanies a journalism degree is applicable to a larger range of careers and activities.

Runnels recommends that the university at least offer some introductory journalism courses within the school of Arts and Sciences rather than at University College. However, she also believes that the major can and should be created.

“I think that the major would elevate Wash U’s status as a school,” said Runnels. “An institution as high caliber as this one should give its students a range of options.”

Brown knows that creating the major will be incredibly difficult, financially. The university’s 6.5 billion dollar endowment “has strings attached to it,” he explained.

The money to start a journalism program at Wash U and hire some tenured faculty members would likely require reallocation of Arts and Sciences funds as well as generous donations. But when there’s a will, there’s a way, as Brown quips.

Brown is already thinking about solutions. He said that the major can be started in two ways: top-down, where someone is willing to fund it, or bottom-up, where surveys showing undergraduate students’ strong desire for a journalism major compel administration to act.

[pullquote]Brown is already thinking about solutions. He said that the major can be started in two ways: top-down, where someone is willing to fund it, or bottom-up, where surveys showing undergraduate students’ strong desire for a journalism major compel administration to act.[/pullquote]

Brown recommended that students first demonstrate a desire for the creation of the major through surveys. He added that conversations would need to occur with Jen Smith, the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Wash U, in order to initiate a major within Arts and Sciences. Brown noted that Smith is already on board with the idea of a journalism major, as she had supported the English Department’s journalism concentration proposal.

Chochrek argues that there already is significant student interest in a journalism major, and that while it may begin small, the major would still be very beneficial to the Wash U community.

She proposed that the journalism major come with a stipulation: students can major in journalism as long as they have a second major in
another field, ideally one that they would like to write about. This, modeled on the double major requirement for education majors, would ensure the applicability of students’ journalism skills to real world situations and give future journalism majors a well-rounded liberal arts degree.

Runnels suggested an alternative option: students can major in journalism and concentrate in a given area, such as news reporting, sports, film or photojournalism, each of which will require a couple of additional classes relevant to the specific concentration.

She also recommended that the major require some technology classes, such as those from the computer science department, given the contemporary shift towards online publications. The major could even include such requirements as interviewing professors about their research or producing news segments and writing articles in conjunction with campus organizations such as KWUR, something from which the greater Wash U student body and faculty could benefit.

[pullquote]Yet these dreams and suggestions are nothing without concrete proposals and actions.[/pullquote]

Yet these dreams and suggestions are nothing without concrete proposals and actions. Washington University is an incredible institution. It aims to provide its students with education they need to succeed post-graduation. It now has an opportunity to redesign its future, to create a new program, to give journalist hopefuls the tools and training to impact people around the globe with their stories. Perhaps Wash U will begin another construction project soon.

Kayla Steinberg ‘20 studies in the College of Arts & Sciences. She can be reached at kaylasteinberg@wustl.edu.