<p>hi I am deeply considering Boston college. I will be attending next year if I am accepted. Journalism has always been my dream and I am wondering how good and how successful is their broadcast journalism program / communications program? </p>
<p>Additionally I really love everything about Boston college I’m just not sure if it’s smart to attend there for my future career. Advice? </p>
<p>A recommendation for a future journalist is to major in something else such as economics, political science, environmental studies, Spanish/Hispanic Studies, Arabic, etc, etc.
Boston College is a solid school but highly selective - what are your stats and have you run the Net Price Calculator to see whether it’d be affordable? What other schools have you looked into?</p>
<p>Do you mean Boston University? As far as I know, Boston College only offers communications, not journalism. Where did you apply, BU or BC?</p>
<p>@MYOS1634 thanks so much! I’ve looked into UF, USC (South Carolina), Northwestern which is my 1st choice, UNC, and UM. @Dunboyne nope I mean Boston COLLEGE not U.</p>
<p>The #1 undergraduate program for journalism is at Mizzou (University of Missouri).</p>
<p>@MYOS1634 I know that but I don’t want to go there</p>
<p>okay then, you have your bases covered academically - remember to have a “content” major as it’ll help you find a job.
Have you run the NPCs and shown the results to your parents?</p>
<p>@MYOS1634 yeah I’ve shown them the net price calculations and they are on board! </p>
<p>Thanks OP. BC has a concentration in journalism, but if you’re after “broadcast journalism” in particular, their offerings look to be slim. </p>
<p>Are you attracted more to pre-professional training (journalism school) or to communications theory? </p>
<p>You can also get into journalism in less obvious ways. You can study a subject that is typically important in media (e.g. economics/business, political science), developing your writing/speaking skills, proficiency with media tech (on your own), maybe learning how to program (always handy when you’re around tech). Network, like your life depended on it. Intern. IMO, that’s the better route into journalism. Good work is really hard to find in that field, so having that backup major in the bag allows you to pursue work in other fields (e.g. business, gov’t) much more easily in case you get stuck in menial, doughnut-hauling roles within journalism. </p>
<p>Hope you applied to USC. U of SC has a strong program and is getting ready to move into new facilities. If you balance journalism with some other area of interest it is pretty easy to do there (I was a J-school grad). If you want to get a business emphasis to go with journalism, USC now offers a coordinated summer program of business courses that allows you to basically get a business minor/emphasis in one summer. Good stats will get you reduced or waived OOS tuition which might be a real positive.</p>
<p>Mizzou, Syracuse and Northwestern are probably the 3 biggest, but we have many people who went to Podunk U as well. We have a significant percentage who weren’t even Journalism or Communications majors. Producers for example can be English majors etc. </p>
<p>@Dunboyne brought up some good points. It is a tough major to get your foot in the door and you often have to slave away at really low paying jobs (often part time) for years after your first job. Having said that, however, you can move up quickly if you work hard and show initiative, because lots of young kids today don’t do that. </p>
<p>We had one kid who interned last year and was such a hard worker that they were offered a position after their internship ended. They then worked their last semester while going to school full time. Within a year they had moved up to a Social News position in the newsroom and they were just offered the same job at one of our larger stations in a great city. </p>
<p>UIowa is a great journalism school as well</p>