As designers become more influential in helping businesses create strategies related to technology and innovation, expect to see continuing innovations in design education.
The University of Southern California, Condé Nast and WIRED have announced a partnership to create a new online Master’s degree in Integrated Design, Business and Technology. The partnership combines the expertise of the editors, writers, and designers at WIRED with the academic rigor of USC.
USC is a leading research university known for pioneering interdisciplinary programs. For more than 20 years, WIRED has been a source of information and ideas that make sense of a world in transformation. WIRED reaches more than 30 million each month through WIRED.com, the print and digital magazine, social media and live events. The WIRED conversation illuminates how technology is changing every aspect of our lives—from culture and business to science and design. Breakthroughs reported in WIRED lead to new ways of thinking, new connections, and new industries.
The aim of the new 18-24 month Master’s Degree in Integrated Design, Business and Technology is to educate creative thinkers and technologists to better equip them to transform the world of industry and enterprise.
The Dean of the USC Roski School of Art and Design Erica Muhl and WIRED Editor in Chief Scott Dadich announced the new online degree at WIRED By Design, a live magazine event held at Skywalker Ranch in Marin, Calif.
The new master’s degree will offer specially designed coursework from the Roski School, the USC Marshall School of Business, the USC Viterbi School of Engineering and other leading programs at the university. The program is scheduled to begin in the 2015-2016 academic year.
“The pace of technology development requires higher education to continue to respond with programs that are flexible and adaptable, and that meet the needs of future cultural and business leaders,” said Dean Muhl.
“We’ve been thinking for years about what a university curriculum with WIRED would look like, and now we have a chance to build it with a terrific partner,” said Dadich. “Taking the best from USC and WIRED, we can teach discipline and disruption, business fundamentals, and the very latest innovation models from Silicon Valley.”
USC’s online graduate education model builds upon the historic role of the traditional university while incorporating advances of the digital age. USC currently offers more than 80 programs online to approximately 8,000 graduate and executive education students.
In addition to offering a unique curriculum, the format of the new Master’s Degree program will offer distinctive opportunities to its participants, including: residencies at WIRED headquarters, exclusive audiences with WIRED leaders and conference speakers, and access to WIRED’s highly respected editors and writers, as well as leading industry icons.
Students in the program will be immersed in the culture of WIRED’s award-winning edit and design team, learning how they report, interpret and anticipate the next big breakthroughs in business, science, technology, design, and culture.
“WIRED is recognized as a source for up-to-the-minute ideas, analysis and perspective,” said Robert A. Sauerberg Jr, President of Condé Nast, which publishes WIRED. “Today we’re announcing the first of several partnerships we plan to create that will merge the knowledge and expertise of Condé Nast’s brands with distinguished academic programs to develop the next generation of talent. Given its reputation as an innovator, it makes perfect sense that WIRED is the first.”
USC’s program development and build out will be powered by higher education partners Synergis Education and Qubed Education. Synergis helps colleges and universities design and launch programs of distinction by creating unique learning environments and supporting recruitment, retention and student services. Qubed establishes new partnerships between top-tier universities and leading media organizations and brands to create high-quality innovations in world-class higher education institutions.
LINKS
USC Roski School of Art and Design
WIRED: Come Learn at WIRED and USC’s New Degree Program
