GRADUATE PROGRAM IN DIGITAL FUTURES
Description
The Graduate Program in Digital Futures is a unique, practice-based program for future innovators, leaders and creators of digital media and new technologies. The program is situated within the Digital Futures Initiative (DFI) at OCAD University, a set of cross-disciplinary programs in practice, research and innovation related to digital media and its emergent developments. The DFI builds on OCAD U's historic strength in digital curriculum and research, providing ongoing innovation and foresight in curriculum, teaching and creative digital practice.
The Graduate Program in Digital Futures offers both a part-time Graduate Diploma and full-time Master’s (MA, MFA or MDes).
Objectives
The objectives of the Graduate Diploma in Digital Futures are:
- To educate innovators and leaders in digital technologies who wish to augment their knowledge of digital technologies and their implications for future development and opportunities across a wide range of professions and industries. Students will be encouraged to develop strategic technologies and applications that create sustainable value, and address pressing societal issues pertinent to their particular area of interest in the public, private, industrial, governmental or voluntary sectors.
- To educate and train artists, designers and IT professionals to formulate and design innovative digital applications, products and services.
- To enable students to imagine creative practical responses to complex societal issues through the development and deployment of digital technologies and media.
- To promote an ethical and sustainable approach to design and the innovative uses of technology.
The objectives of the Master’s in Digital Futures are:
- To educate innovators and leaders in digital media and technologies. Students and graduates will contribute to the development and application of new knowledge in digital technology practices, content and experiences by providing insights into human needs in a technologically mediated and dependent world.
- To provide systematic and conceptual understanding and the methodological competence needed to research, frame, critique, explore, make and test new methods of technological innovation, creation and production.
- To integrate disciplinary knowledge from computer science, design, art, the social sciences, humanities, communication and technology with relevant knowledge outside of these fields in an interdisciplinary approach that facilitates a critical awareness of current problems and affords new insights.
- To build competence in research processes in the critical analysis of questions, problems and issues within the fields of technology and digital media.
- To enable students to develop the intellectual independence needed to navigate complex problems through the study of digital media/technologies, digital design and art methodologies, digital new media theory, and their historical precedents and contemporary applications.
- To promote an ethical and sustainable approach to research, design and creative uses of technology in the pursuit of humane and innovative social change.
Required Courses
Graduate Diploma in Digital Futures
Curriculum: 24 credits
Master's in Digital Futures
Curriculum: 48 credits
*MA students may take GGRA 6B01 Contemporary Research Methods by permission of the Graduate Program Director
Students completing an MFA or MDes degree must also complete the following:
Students completing an MA degree must also complete the following:
Electives
The following electives are options for students in both the Graduate Diploma and Master's Programs:
(not all courses are offered each term)
In addition, students in the Master's program may choose from:
- Approved graduate level courses in other OCAD U graduate programs.
- A 300- or 400-level undergraduate course in any discipline, with the approval of the instructor and Graduate Program Director (supplementary readings and a graduate level research project or essay are to be arranged with the instructor).
- A graduate course at another university through the Ontario Visiting Graduate Student Plan (OVGS), or the Canadian University Graduate Transfer Agreement (CUGTA).
Summer Options
(Master's program only)
Students must make their summer plans in consultation with their Supervisory Committee and the Graduate Program Director. Among the options available to students in this program are:
- Internship
Internships provide graduate students with opportunities to gain experience in the professional world that will complement their studies. Onsite work is performed under the guidance of the internship sponsor and the internship credit is supervised and evaluated by an OCAD U faculty member. Internships with suitable industry or institutional sponsors must support the student's program of study, and be approved by the Graduate Program Director.
- Residency
Residency opportunities may be identified by the program and/or the individual student. All residencies must support the student's program of study, and be approved by the Graduate Program Director.
- Graduate Exchange
Opportunities exist for provincial, national and international graduate exchange, with a number of exchange opportunities in development with affiliated universities worldwide. All graduate exchanges must support the student's program of study and depend upon approval by the Graduate Program Director, as well as acceptance by the host graduate program and university.
- Elective
Subject to available course offerings.
Last Modified:1/24/2012 12:57:29 PM
