Schools and Academic Units

The College of Information and Communications, as its name implies, is dedicated to understanding how information is stored, accessed, analyzed and synthesized, as well as how it is shared across today’s vast and ever-evolving communications landscape. Our schools and academic units focus on equipping students with the skills to navigate complex information systems and communicate effectively in a rapidly changing digital world. Through innovation and interdisciplinary collaboration, we prepare graduates to lead in industries driven by data, technology and global connectivity.

Information and Communication Studies Unit

The national focus on communication skills as essential to employable university graduates has never been stronger. The interdisciplinary Information and Communication Studies unit serves the state of South Carolina by providing a place to expand upon our university’s information and communication curriculum.

Programs housed in this interdisciplinary unit expand the ability of the CIC to offer degrees that strengthen the workforce with critical skills such as working in teams for successful collaboration, analysis of information and communication problems and questions in society, and management in information and communication contexts to transform personal and public livelihood.

School of Information Science

The School of Information Science has dramatically expanded its academic and community outreach programs to match the rapidly evolving information landscape. Long a highly regarded professional program for librarians and media specialists, we have added undergraduate and doctoral programs. We have been a leader in distributed learning with classes on campus and online across the state and across the country. The school is a literacy champion through our South Carolina Center for Community Literacy and Cocky’s Reading Express™ reaching children and schools across the state.

Transforming data into knowledge and knowledge into action — we prepare information experts for businesses, libraries, schools and communities. We develop community-minded leaders with technical expertise and creative problem-solving skills who solve complex challenges at the intersection of data, technology and society.

School of Journalism and Mass Communications

The School of Journalism and Mass Communications is nationally accredited by the Accrediting Council on Education in Journalism and Mass Communications.

We teach communication — all types — from time-tested techniques to the unbounded possibilities of digital media. Scholars and professionals in journalism, advertising, public relations, sports media and visual communications bring their experience and their vision of new possibilities to the school’s classrooms, laboratories and studios. We’re visual and textual, informative and persuasive, for undergraduate and graduate students. We were founded at USC in 1923, making us one of the oldest communications schools in the country. We’re proud of that and of our brand new, state-of-the-art building in the heart of campus.

College of Information and Communications