Fairfield’s Sacred Heart University is establishing a School of Communication and Media Arts, building on its new facility and communication department.
The school will be located in the Frank and Marisa Martire Business & Communications Center, which opened in March. The building includes a television studio, a film production soundstage, a motion capture lab, a media theater and multimedia classrooms, post-production labs and screening rooms.
Professor James Castonguay, founding director of the School of Communication and Media Arts, said becoming a school is the next chapter in the communication program’s development. The communication department’s undergraduate and graduate programs have been under the College of Arts and Sciences.
Robin Cautin, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, said the program’s status as a school will attract leading media executives, artists and scholars to the newly established residency programs in the College of Arts and Sciences. Cautin said the school has distinguished faculty including internationally recognized scholars as well as accomplished industry professionals.
“The school”™s centralized location in the Martire Center will facilitate interdisciplinary and intercollegiate programming,” Cautin said.
Castonguay said communication students will learn how to integrate all aspects of digital media production into storytelling.
The new SCMA will offer undergraduate and graduate programs in advertising, public relations and corporate communications; film, television and digital media production; digital journalism and broadcasting; digital communications, media literacy and theatre arts. It will also be home to the student radio and television stations, newspaper, magazine and the public relations and media production student clubs.
“Our educational goal is to graduate ethical practitioners, critical thinkers and creative professionals who are well-versed in the liberal arts and Catholic intellectual traditions and have the skills necessary to compete successfully for the most coveted jobs in the communications and media industries,” Castonguay said.
