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Expand your storytelling toolkit with an online master of science in data science and analytics with an emphasis in strategic communications and data journalism from the University of Missouri.
For journalists and marketing professionals, digital technologies have shaped how you identify and write to an audience and gather information. The online master’s in data science and analytics grows your knowledge of key tools, languages and visualization techniques, while this industry-specific emphasis area helps you unlock the full power of big data for developing more meaningful campaigns or transforming numbers into a breaking story.
Your journalism career may have started with phone calls and emails to sources and now likely incorporates social media in varying degrees. The strategic communications and data journalism emphasis builds from these developments to help you better analyze and draw insights from the growing amount of structured and unstructured data available to marketing and journalism professionals. Along with training you to compile and examine information, this program instructs you in communicating your findings, be it in written, visual or oral forms, to specific audiences and the ethics surrounding these techniques.
Explore other emphasis areas from Mizzou's master of science in data science and analytics:
Quick facts
Official name
Master of science in data science and analytics with an emphasis in strategic communications and data journalismCampus
Program type
Master's degreeAcademic home
Graduate School | MU Institute for Data Science and InformaticsDelivery mode
100% onlineAccreditation
Higher Learning CommissionCredit hours
34Estimated cost
$35,094.80*This cost is for illustrative purposes only. Your hours and costs will differ, depending on your transfer hours, your course choices and your academic progress. See more about tuition and financial aid.
Why earn a master’s in strategic communications and data journalism?
Journalism constantly evolves — from how you identify sources to how you tell a story. Similarly, for marketing and communications efforts, a clever tagline just scratches the surface — and might even get glossed over by certain audiences. Data and the tools for gathering, analyzing and visualizing your insights help you uncover and pursue new audiences, assist with more tailored remarketing efforts and allow you to track the success of a campaign.
Our program was ranked No. 9 by Fortune.com for "Best Online Master's in Data Science Programs in 2023". This underscores Mizzou's mission to meet the high demand for training today's top data science professionals. The online master’s in data science and analytics with a strategic communications and data journalism emphasis highlights the path ahead to becoming a stronger storyteller. Understand how to acquire, cleanse and analyze public and consumer data sources, create illuminating visualizations and infographics and ethically use data science in journalism and marketing contexts to influence the public. To reach these objectives, you’ll:
- Begin by acquiring a broader understanding of big data analytics, including essential tools, languages, its mathematical and statistical foundation, techniques like machine learning and data mining, database management, visualization methods, ethics and real-world applications
- Learn how to acquire, stage and examine large structured and unstructured data sets, including for solving problems, influencing decisions and developing a story
- See how data can help you identify customer and viewer behavior patterns in order to develop or enhance marketing campaigns
- Explore how data can help you better understand media markets and refine use of apps, social media and other media and branding techniques
- Start to use analytics as an audience-analysis and communication tool, including for search, programmatic advertising, buying and behavioral targeting
- See where analytics and journalistic ethics overlap for acquiring, assessing and utilizing data from a number of sources, including open-records laws
- Get some insight into data analytics’ place in a news organization
- Be taught by world-class faculty and data science professionals ready to impart industry-specific insights
Career prospects
Between 2020 and 2030, the Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts steady, if not above-average, growth for media and communications occupations. The skills needed to access these opportunities start from your existing knowledge base and factor in the influence of big data. Take your career to the next level while becoming a 21st century storyteller and reporter.
Potential job titles include:
- Data insights analyst
- Data editor
- Data and graphics journalist
- Data scientist/algorithmic targeting
- News data editor
Program structure
The online master’s in data science and analytics involves a demanding 19-credit-hour core covering basic languages and tools, nine credit hours for the strategic communications and data journalism emphasis, a case study (three credit hours) and a capstone (three credit hours).
While the program uses a semester structure, courses are held in eight-week blocks. Courses are entirely online, although you may attend an optional on-campus Data Science Week in the spring where you can collaborate with and gain real-world insights from our faculty members and partnering industry professionals.
Introducing you to broadly applied aspects of data science and analytics, the core goes over statistical formulas, methods for assessing, cleaning and modeling data, visualization tools and techniques, database system design and management, industry ethics, data collection and storage security and applied machine learning.
As you aim to carry your skills into your career, the case study and capstone project will present two applied learning scenarios. First, you’ll practice what you’ve acquired in an eight-week group project during the summer semester. Then, you’ll attempt to devise a solution to a real-world problem under the guidance of faculty and industry experts.
Strategic communications and data journalism courses
Delve into how data enhances journalism and marketing efforts with courses going over:
- Data analytics related to communication, organizing and network structure and dynamics
- Streaming social media data management and analytics for collecting and analyzing Twitter data
- Digital strategy-building techniques involving Facebook Insights, Google Ads, Google Analytics, Adobe Analytics and other platforms for optimization, examining metrics and establishing key performance indicators
Delivery
100% onlineCalendar system
Semester-basedTypical program length
2 yearsAccreditation
The University of Missouri is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission, one of six regional institutional accreditors in the United States.
Faculty spotlight
David Herzog has more than 30 years of experience as an investigative reporter, data journalist and educator. He is part of the interdisciplinary team that launched the online master’s in data science and analytics program at the University of Missouri. He developed and teaches a data journalism class and enjoys discovering how journalists can use data analysis tools to uncover the news better. As the academic adviser to the National Institute for Computer-Assisted Reporting, he helps guide data services for Investigative Reporters and Editors (IRE), a global organization with more than 5,000 members based at the Journalism School. He also helps direct the Dow Jones News Fund’s data journalism residency program for IRE.
Dr. Perry served as coordinator of the Missouri School of Journalism’s doctoral teaching program for six years and as chair of journalism studies from 2005-2011 and during the 2013-14 academic year. He currently serves as chair of the Publications Committee for the Association on Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC).
Dr. Perry is the lead instructor for the Missouri School of Journalism’s cross cultural journalism course. His research interests are African-American press history, specifically the Black Press during the first half of the 20th Century.