Courtney Laverdure
Staff writer
A new graduate program for organizational communication began this month at Murray State’s Madisonville Regional Campus.
Seven organizational communication professors from Murray State’s College of Business will instruct a 16 month master’s degree in organizational communication.
The seven professors from the college of business participating in this accelerated program include Steve Cox, Michael Bokeno, Tina Coffelt, David Gesler, Frances Smith, John Spinda and Lou Davidson Tillson.
“I am excited to teach accelerated M.S. courses in organizational communication at the Madisonville Campus based on my experiences with the past two accelerated M.S. cohort groups we’ve had at the Paducah Campus,” John Spinda said. “I admire how determined and committed the typical students in these programs are. Usually, these students are already working full-time in their career field and have family commitments, yet sacrifice so much to be in the classroom after a long work week, just about every other weekend.”
Steve Cox, chair of the Murray State department of organizational communication, coordinated the program with Heather Roy, director of Murray State’s Madisonville Regional Campus.
“This accelerated program allows busy working adults to expand their educations and increase their managerial and leadership skills,” Cox said.
Students have the chance in this program to learn conflict resolution, crisis management, team development, managerial communication and other strategic communication processes necessary for both corporate success and career advancement, he said.
This accelerated Master of Science in organizational communication has been offered since 2007 on a rotational basis throughout Murray State’s service region, once at the Hopkinsville Regional Campus and twice at the Paducah Regional Campus. Madisonville is the next site in the rotation.
“This program represents our department’s efforts to help meet Murray State enrollment objectives set by President Dunn,” Cox said. “The support of Dunn, Brian Vanhorn, the dean of the Center for Continuing Education and Academic Outreach, and Tim Todd, the dean of the College of Business, have been key to sustaining this program’s success since its inception”.
The 16-month program includes eleven courses beginning in January and ending in May 2013.
Courses will be taught combining online and weekend instruction. The weekend classes meet a limited number of set dates on Fridays, 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. and/or Saturdays, 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
The classes made available for Spring 2012 are COM 680: Advanced Organizational Communication, COM 635: Customer Communication and COM 690: Research Methods.
A total of 31 hours are required to graduate with a master’s in organizational communication.
This program is being offered to help students improve their skills for job opportunities and to give the students more hands on programs, Cox said.
Heather Roy, director of the Madisonville Regional Campus, said ideally enrollment numbers will be around 20 to 25 students for this rotation of the accelerated masters program.
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