IDA CCR-Princeton history

Journalism education at the University of Wisconsin began in 1904 with a single professor, Willard Grosvenor Bleyer, a single course, Law and The Press, and 25 students.

1912 The School of Oratory within the College of Liberal Arts is formed.

Having initially began in 1916, the journalism program becomes the School of Journalism within the USC College of Letters, Arts and Sciences.

In 1922, the school’s name was changed to Beverly School for the Deaf to reflect a decreased focus from an industrial/trade school to a more academic setting, as well as the recognition that students could develop oral language skills.

The English department began offering journalism classes in 1923.

1924 George Starr Lasher is hired as director of the new Department of Journalism.

1925 Students begin taking elective courses in which they report and edit copy for The Athens Messenger.

In 1928, the College of Liberal Arts offered its first courses in Library Science when it launched an undergraduate school library media education program.

The first public relations classes were offered in 1932.

1936 The School of Journalism is created as part of the College of Commerce (now the College of Business) and is housed on the ground floor of Ewing Hall.

Two years after the end of World War II, the Department of Journalism began inside the College of Business under the leadership of Willis Tucker in 1947.

Ralph O. Nafziger’s arrival as director in 1949 began an insistence on new rigor in research.

Among the first such Ph.D. programs in the nation, it granted its first degree in 1953.

After years of growth, the Department of Journalism become the School of Journalism in 1957.

Established on April 20, 1965, the Daily Beacon succeeded the Orange and White as the student newspaper on campus.

1968 The College of Communication is established.

The College of Communications was founded on July 1, 1969.

1970 The schools of Radio-Television and Journalism move into the new $4.1 million Radio-Television Building.

An independent Graduate School of Library and Information Science was established in 1971 and housed in the Temple Court Building.

The school moved to its first permanent, dedicated home in 1972, with the opening of Vilas Communication Hall.

The college awarded its first Phd degree in 1977.

Additional national recognition for the college includes five winners of the College Photographer of the Year award since 1978 and 25 Pulitzer Prizes won by its alums.

1980 The Center for Communication Management is created.

While the city of Knoxville was looking toward the energy future at the 1982 World’s Fair, the College of Communications was also forward-facing with the launch of WUTK that same year.

1983 The School of Radio-Television becomes the School of Telecommunications, today one of the largest programs of its kind in the United States.

1984 The renovation of Carnegie Hall into Scripps Hall begins.

The Department of Speech Communication was founded on July 1, 1987, and Lorayne Lester was selected as the first department head.

Five years later, it is designated a school, and in 1988 it becomes the J. Warren McClure School of Communication Systems Management to recognize the contributions of the Ohio University alumnus and former Gannett Co. executive.

The School of Information Studies was founded in 1989, serving as a forerunner to the Center for Information and Communications Studies.

The Graduate School of Library and Information Science became the School of Information Sciences in 1994.

The School of Information Sciences offered its first course on the internet in 1999 and admitted students into a fully web-based distance degree program in 2000. It was a decade of great change for the school, which admitted its first doctoral student in 1996.

1998 The new Scripps Survey Research Center allows results of student-conducted public opinion polls to be distributed worldwide by Scripps.

For many years, public relations was a part of the journalism curriculum before joining advertising as the School of Advertising and Public Relations in 2003.

In 2004, the school began an expansion of its services to students with Autism, Developmental delays and other disabilities under the umbrella of communication challenges.

2005 The Telecommunications Center changes its name to the WOUB Center for Public Media.

The youngest of the schools in the college and the first of its kind in the state, it is renamed the J. Warren McClure School of Information and Telecommunication Systems in 2006.

The college-wide research center was renamed Center for Information and Communication Studies in 2007.

In 2008, the organization changed its name to The Children’s Center for Communication/Beverly School for the Deaf (CCCBSD) to include students with a wide variety of special needs and communication challenges.

In 2009, the USC Board of Trustees voted to officially change the school’s name to the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism.

The Scripps Convergence Lab opened in 2010.