An evolving world demands media leaders with a command of new technologies, the creativity of a storyteller, and a deep understanding of the issues challenging people and the planet.
The media studies community here operates at the intersection of intellectual rigor and creative and technological innovation. Our graduate programs are among the first of their kind in the world, having their origin in the Center for Understanding Media, established in 1975. Today we are part of The New School, a comprehensive university where emergent media practice and an awareness of media history come together to bring about positive change in the world.
graduate programs
330 students in the Media Studies community
26
Average age of Media Studies students
22
Number of countries represented by students in Media Studies programs
46% international students
A Contemporary Approach to Media
Graduate programs in the School of Media Studies integrate current media theory, research, production, design, and management. Your investigations of media form and content draw on contemporary media theory, philosophical frameworks, and methods of critical analysis. You acquire professional media production skills in areas including cinematography, film editing, and post-production as well as media management skills such as business planning, audience analysis, and entrepreneurship.
Work in the program typically develops in two ways. You can either build a generalist portfolio that showcases a broad range of critically informed work or focus on a specific mode of media research, production, or another domain in the growing creative industry. Classes are led by distinguished fulltime and part-time faculty, including media theorists, media designers, film directors, film distributors, documentary filmmakers, musicians, interdisciplinary scholars, technology researchers, and other industry professionals who are well established in the evolving media economy.
“Students come to The New School specifically because of its reputation for being socially conscious and civically engaged.”
—Vladan Nikolic , dean of the School of Media Studies and independent film director and producer
Your learning is supported by interaction with peers and the vibrant storytelling and media landscape. You benefit from our dynamic community of creative media makers, artists, entrepreneurs, and thinkers here in New York City, a historic center for creative and theoretical collaboration. As a major urban university, we’re able to offer you access to a range of media industry networks, including global media and technology corporations, NYC start-up enterprises, and community, civic, and cultural organizations. And if you want to join our community from outside NYC, you can take courses in the MA Media Studies, MS Media Management, and Graduate Certificate in Media Management programs online.
You can also take courses and collaborate with peers in the university’s graduate programs in the social sciences at The New School for Social Research, in art and design at Parsons School of Design, and in management and public policy at the Milano School of Policy, Management, and Environment. These collaborations inspire fresh thinking and challenge you to imagine the application of media in broader contexts. Our innovative, flexible programs prepare you for a fulfilling career as a media artist, producer, scholar, activist, or manager in the creative industries.
A Home for Media Analysis, Creation, and Innovation
Theory and Research
Media studies draws on the social sciences, the arts, and the humanities to critically examine the history, content, function, and impact of mediating technologies. Our programs offer a variety of opportunities for original academic research, imaginative projects, and civic engagement. Topics of scholarly investigation range widely:
• Media, power, and resistance
• Documentary and interactive media
• Cultures of sound and music
• Discourse analysis
• Media in comparative global contexts
• Political media
• The social production of race, class, and gender
• Media archaeology
• Digital media forms
• Global media cultures
Media Production
The curricula of all Media Studies MA and MS programs incorporate a production component. You have access to dedicated studios and equipment for film and video, audio, and digital interactive projects. Courses and workshops cover documentary, narrative, experimental, and integrated approaches in video, film, audio, and multimedia production. You develop and complete a distinctive portfolio and projects that align with current and emerging fields in media making.
Media Management
In an environment where technologies, platforms, and entire industries are changing every day, business knowledge as well as leadership and management skills is essential to career success. At The New School, you’ll learn principles and best practices of responsible and effective business management that will equip you for a career in today’s media, technology, and entertainment industries. Courses cover critical management topics including:
• Innovation and entrepreneurship
• Marketing and media sales
• Integrated media strategies
• Data analytics
• Project management
This dynamic STEM-eligible graduate program enables students to study theories, histories, and critical practices of mediated communication and media forms, bringing together thinking and doing. Informed by a commitment to critical inquiry and transformative production rooted in social justice and emancipatory frameworks, the program is designed to open up a wide range of careers—creative, academic, and professional.
Curriculum Overview
Through the curriculum, you build a foundation in media theory and practice. From there, you can determine your own course of specialization, focusing on one or more of several thematic areas specified by the School of Media Studies or designing your own. Our faculty’s wide-ranging expertise and our modular curricular structure enable you to develop unique approaches to scholarship, criticism, and production. To learn more, visit newschool.edu/media-studies-curriculum.
Career paths: film, television, and radio; social and interactive media development; commercial advertising and public relations; nonprofits and community organizing; teaching and higher education
Degree Requirements
The Master of Arts is awarded for completion of 39 credits. All students must take three foundation courses and a minimum of two production courses. You can pursue a thesis track culminating in a faculty-supervised research paper or an independent media project on any platform. Or you can choose the non-thesis track, which offers you flexibility by giving you nine elective courses to select from. The curriculum is designed to be completed in two years of full-time study, but part-time study is an option.
Required Courses (9 credits)
Media Theory
Media Design or Media Practices
One research methods course
Examples of Seminar Electives (12–21 credits)
Black Music, Media, and Society
Software and Difference
Gender, Culture, and Media
Carceral Media
Decolonizing Documentary
Digital War Robots as Media
Examples of Production Electives (6–15 credits)
Storytelling Across Media
Media Practices: AI
Projects: Transforming Data
Media Practices: Digital Video Production
Cinematography and Lighting
Interactive Documentary
User Experience Design and Prototype
Examples of Research Methods Courses
Documentary Research Methods
Designing Methods for Studying Media
Black Feminist Media Methods
Script Analysis and Audience Response
newschool.edu/media-courses
Subject Areas
The curriculum offers evolving thematic course clusters that allow you to delve deeper into areas of practice and research with the guidance of faculty specialists. These areas include:
• Digital Storytelling
• Film Production
• Media History, Criticism, Philosophy
• Sound Studies
Study Online or on Campus
• Integrated Media Practices
• Experimental Media Art
• Decolonial Approaches to Media
• Documentary Studies
Many courses in the School of Media Studies are offered online. You can complete all MA degree requirements online or take any combination of online and on-campus courses. This program was named Best Online Degree for Flexibility by onlinecollege.org.
Graduate Certificate Options
The New School offers one-year graduate-level certificate programs1 in documentary media studies and in media management. Students who have taken courses for a certificate may be able to apply them to MA degree requirements if they apply and are admitted to the degree program.
1
Media Management MS
This innovative STEM-designated graduate program is designed for professionals who are already working in the media sector and are seeking career advancement. The MS curriculum brings together media business practices and critical analysis of the vast media ecosystem, communication industries, and new and emerging products and services.
Curriculum Overview
The course of study is flexible, interdisciplinary, and future oriented, emphasizing adaptation to the rapid evolution of media platforms. It introduces principles and practices of responsible and effective management applicable to a range of fields and industries.
To learn more, visit newschool.edu/media-management-curriculum.
Career paths: television; radio; cinema; publishing; advertising; journalism; social and interactive media
Degree Requirements
The Master of Science is awarded for successful completion of 36 credits as described on page 14. All students must take four foundational management courses and complete a capstone project, a business plan, a management solutions research project, or another approved project. The program is designed to be completed in two years of full-time study, but part-time study is an option.
Examples of Courses
Media Ethics
Media Practices: Digital Video Production
Black Feminist Media Methods
Media Theory
Managing Innovation in Media newschool.edu/media-courses
Required Courses (12 credits)
Media Management and Leadership
Media Economics
Media Ethics
Media Design
Elective Courses (21 credits)
Three additional management courses
One production course (in any medium or multimedia)
Three media theory and research courses
Capstone Project (3 credits)
Examples of Production Electives
Media Analytics
Media Practices: Digital Cinema
Projects: Interactive Design
Producing Webisodes
The Producer’s Craft
Examples of Popular Theory and Research Electives
Audience Research
Designing Methods for Media
Digital Media Theory
Film Distribution and New Media
Media Futures
Urban Intelligence
“The Media Management program offers students transformative learning opportunities to become effective and socially engaged media professionals in the heart of New York City, where theory meets practice in the epicenter of global media innovation.”
Neyda
Martinez , Media Management program director and associate professor
Elective Subject Areas
Media management courses provide students with the skills and strategies needed in the rapidly evolving media industry, focusing on five core subject areas:
• Innovation and entrepreneurship
• Marketing and media sales
• Integrated media strategies
Study Online or on Campus
• Data analytics
• Project management
You can study on campus in New York City or take any combination of online and on-campus courses. Many students complete the MS in Media Management program entirely online.
Graduate Certificate Option
The New School offers a one-year graduate-level certificate program1 in media management. Students who have taken courses for the certificate may be able to apply them toward MA degree requirements if they apply and are admitted to the degree program.
1
Course Offerings: MA and MS Programs
The curriculum at the School of Media Studies positions graduates at the intersection of critical theory and emergent media practices. Our world-renowned faculty introduce you to traditional and avant-garde media methodologies and theory in courses with titles like Girl Innovators; Queer and Trans Media; AI and the Media Industry: Practices, Promises, and Perils; Counter-curating: Alternative Film Festivals; and Animating Resistance: The Subversive Art of Experimental Animation.
To learn more, visit newschool.edu/media-studies-curriculum.
Graduate Minors
In keeping with our commitment to interdisciplinary scholarship and collaboration, The New School offers graduate minors—structured study pathways that immerse you in disciplines outside of your primary field, expose you to alternative modes of research and practice, and broaden your skills and career options. You have the option of completing a graduate minor in a closely related field—such as Transmedia and Digital Storytelling, Impact Entrepreneurship, or Civic Service Design—or exploring other subjects and emerging interdisciplinary issues in a minor such as Capitalism Studies, Global Urban Futures, or Design and Urban Justice.
For a complete list, visit newschool.edu/graduate-minors .
Documentary Media Studies
Graduate Certificate
The Graduate Certificate in Documentary Media Studies1 is an intensive professional education program for prospective documentarians. In the course of a year, each student develops, shoots, directs, and edits an original short documentary movie on a New York City–related subject, which is screened at the annual Truth Be Told Documentary Festival. Production work is informed by courses on the history and theory of documentary filmmaking.
Curriculum Overview
The certificate is awarded for completion of six courses (18 credits) and a short digital video documentary. The curriculum consists of five required courses (15 credits) and one elective (3 credits) chosen from the School of Media Studies’ graduate curriculum.
To learn more, visit newschool.edu/doc-cert-curriculum.
Examples of Elective Courses
Decolonizing Documentary Documentary Practice and Emerging Media
The Poetics of Witnessing Documentary Research Methods
Audio Post-production
Other Program Activities
Doc Talks is a required monthly screening series featuring guest artists working in documentary cinema. Recent guests include Miryam Charles, Theo Cuthand, Susana de Sousa Dias, Bing Liu, Raoul Peck, Nico Pereda, RaMell Ross, and Brett Story.
Master Classes: Every spring, during the Dorothy H. Hirshon Film Festival, a distinguished film professional leads master classes to which certificate students are invited. Christine Vachon, an award-winning independent film producer and a founder of Killer Films, served as a recent Hirshon Artist-in-Residence.
Limited and Selective Enrollment
This is a one-year full-time program; part-time study is not an option. Students are admitted in the fall semester only. Required courses are offered only on campus in New York City; the elective course can be taken online if it is offered in that format.
Transfer of Credits to Master’s Program
Students can apply credits earned in the Documentary Media Studies certificate program to the MA in Media Studies if they subsequently apply and are admitted to the degree program.
Media Management
Graduate Certificate
This certificate is a condensed business education program for people working or planning to work on the management side of the media, technology, and entertainment industries, in areas including management, technology development, branding, marketing or communications, as well as consulting and entrepreneurship.
Curriculum Overview
The certificate is awarded for the completion of four approved courses (12 credits) in the School of Media Studies’ Media Management curriculum and a professional synthesis paper that relates the courses to students’ career objectives.
To learn more, visit newschool.edu/mgt-cert-curriculum.
Examples of Management Electives
Media Management and Leadership
Media Economics
Managing Innovation
Media Law
Media Ethics
Multicultural Media Business
The program offers specialized courses on film, television, music, and social media business.
Online or on Campus, Full-Time or Part-Time
Students can complete the Media Management certificate requirements entirely online, study on campus in New York City, or take any combination of online and on-campus courses. The program can be completed within one year of full-time study (two academic terms), but it can also be taken on a part-time basis.
Transfer of Credits to Master’s Program
Students can apply credits earned in the Media Management certificate program to the MS in Media Management or the MA in Media Studies if they subsequently apply and are admitted to either degree program.
Screening Your Work Publicly
Exposure is an important part of reaching audiences and broadening your horizons after study. Our students’ film and video productions find audiences on campus in our Fine Cuts (annual juried student showcase), Ruff Cuts (regular work-in-progress screenings), and Truth Be Told (documentary film) series, which are open to the public. Students’ work has also been screened in leading festivals such as the Berlin Film Festival, the Sundance Film Festival, Hot Docs, the Human Rights Watch International Festival, LA Shorts, DOC NYC, and the Tribeca Film Festival. They have received honors including Academy Awards and Student Academy Awards.
newschool.edu/media-studies/student-work-showcase
Connections That Matter
Our university community invests in your success from the day you enroll onward. Support includes help securing an internship to complement your studies with applied experience. You can access internship opportunities posted on the School of Media Studies’ blog. SMS students have recently interned at organizations including BBC Studies America, Facebook, NBC Sports Group, NBCUniversal, Milk Agency, Sony Music Entertainment, TVSquared, Carolina Hererra, Cloud9, Sony Music, the United Nations Department of Global Communication, Precision Strategies, and Universal Music Group. They also expand their hands-on skills with Red Dog Productions, the school’s production team, which offers video, audio, and still photography recording, live streaming, and editing and post-production services to university partners. The New School’s Career Services team supports graduates with one-on-one advising, workshops, seminars, and networking events with alumni and prospective employers to help them advance toward their academic and professional goals.
newschool.edu/career-services
Working in All Media Fields
• Digital media creation and production
• Film production, cinematography, film editing, screenwriting, and documentary filmmaking
• Media company management
Our Alumni
• Media entrepreneurship
• Education and academia
• Social media campaign design
• Media activists
• Sound and music design
Program graduates bring about change in culture and foster innovation in media through their films, podcasts, film curatorial work, journalism, and content strategy management. Here are a few recent Media Studies alumni.
Dayana Ariza, Media Management ’16, integrated producer at Netflix
Rehana Ismail, Media Studies ’13, film curator and founder of the Cinelogue streaming platform
Lulu Men, Media Management ’20, field producer of the Academy Award–winning documentary American Factory
Andres Bayona, Media Management ’17, senior content strategist at TIAA
V Pappas , Media Studies ’06, former COO of TikTok Global
Valeria Ricciuli, Media Management ’18, bilingual writer-reporter at The Public Good Projects (PublicGoodNews.com)
Lauren Moraski, Media Management ’15, managing editor of editorial content at Amazon Books
Shannon FItzpatrick , Media Studies ’16, film producer and editor of Past Lives
Maya Mumma, Media Studies ’12, editor of the Academy Award–winning documentary O.J.: Made in America
Louise Peres , Media Management ’16, content strategist at Meta (Instagram and Facebook)
To learn more about our alumni, visit newschool.edu/media-studies/outcomes and newschoolmediastudies.org/alumni.
1 Office of the Comptroller estimates
Financial Aid
Our comprehensive financial aid program provides competitive merit-based scholarships and need-based aid for those who qualify. All applicants, including online and international students, are considered for merit aid. We also participate in government grant, loan, and work-study programs as well as programs for veterans of the U.S. armed services.
To learn more about tuition and fees, visit newschool.edu/media-studies/ tuition-fees .
In addition, the School of Media Studies offers a number of fellowships for which students may apply. These include the Impact Entrepreneurship Fellowship, the Deanna Kamiel Fellowship, the Bishwanath and Sandhya Sinha Memorial Endowed Fellowship, and the Public Engagement Fellowship, designed for emerging leaders committed to addressing equity, inclusion, and social justice challenges while pursuing a master’s degree at the Schools of Public Engagement, which houses the Media Studies programs.
The New School also proudly recognizes returning Peace Corps volunteers and partners with organizations such as Fulbright and the Organization of American States to provide scholarships for graduate study in the School of Media Studies’ master’s degree programs.
You don’t need an admission decision to begin applying for financial aid. The Office of Financial Aid can answer questions about applying for financial aid, calculating the overall cost of attendance, and billing and payment options. For more information, visit newschool.edu/media-funding and email questions to sfs@newschool.edu .
89% of School of Media Studies students received institutional financial aid 1
WE ARE THE NEW SCHOOL
Since its founding in 1919, The New School has been a center of independent thought, dialogue, and action. We are a community that applies integrative approaches to global problems and leads the systemic change needed to make the world more equitable, more sustainable, and better designed for all. Today our university is made up of colleges offering courses in art and design, music and performance, the liberal arts and social sciences, management, media, and more.
Get in touch and take the next step
Contact our team, learn about admission requirements, attend an admission event, or make an appointment.
Contact the program
212.229.5150
admission@newschool.edu
For important information including accreditation, student rights, campus safety statistics, and tuition and fees, visit newschool.edu/your-right-to-know. Published 2024 by The New School. The New School is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer. Photo credits: David Barron, Julian Budge, Chris Eckert/Wave, Ben Ferrari, Matthew Mathews, Martin Seck, Michael Kirby Smith/Wave, The New School.
This brochure is printed on 100 percent post-consumer recycled paper with UV inks that conserve energy and material and do not release VOCs into the atmosphere—reflecting the university’s embrace of environmental responsibility.
