The newspaper and online journalism and magazine journalism departments at Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications will combine the resources of both departments for students enrolling in fall 2019.

A combined program puts professors previously separated by different fields under the same department, and targets incoming undergraduates who have an interest in either.

The merger will better reflect industry practices while exploring current approaches to content coverage, said Melissa Chessher, chair of the magazine department and director of magazine, newspaper and online journalism at Newhouse. Chessher will also chair the new merged department.

The new department will be called magazine, news and digital journalism. Faculty from the two departments voted to approve the name last May, and Newhouse faculty voted to approve the name last fall.

For students currently enrolled in Newhouse, not much will change. The final merger needs approval by Newhouse, Syracuse University and New York state, and there won’t be a fully merged curriculum until the Class of 2023 arrives.

“Testing what we are creating, wanting to make sure everyone in department, school and university is comfortable with what we are doing, that takes a while,” Chesser said.

New graduation requirements will be different from the current requirements, she said. The new department will place a greater emphasis on skill-building through editing, additional electives and more general beginning news writing courses, she added.

The timeline of the merger dates back to at least 2017, when a merger task force voted unanimously to combine the two majors. The vote came after the task force looked at peer institutions and interviewed professionals in media industries, Chessher said.

The initial goal of the merger was to create a shared experience in which students could explore more expertise and gain more digital skills while still utilizing existing offerings. Seth Gitner, a professor of visual journalism at Newhouse and co-chair of the task force, said it would be beneficial for magazine students to take journalism classes alongside their peers in the newspaper department.

“I saw that it was obvious that both journalism departments shared so many skill sets,” he said. “By combining the student populations they could have the capability to learn so much more.”

The collaboration between two previously separated departments helps journalism students work together, Chessher said.

“One of the things great about it is that it’s one of the few schools that still offered a magazine major,” Chessher said. “I love the idea that they are together. It’s very reflective of Newhouse family, a name that is synonymous with both newspapers and magazines together.”

Published on March 20, 2018 at 9:04 pm

Contact Ben: bmoleksi@syr.edu