Communications and Media - Sophomore

Course # ECON 1002

Credits 6

Pre-requisites and Co-requisites: None

Course Description

Introductory macroeconomics provides students with key concepts and principles of contemporary macroeconomic theory. Topics covered in the course pertain to the analysis of national income, the real economy, fiscal and monetary policy in the long run. Open economy and short-run economic fluctuations are also explored in the course. Existing debates over macroeconomic policy faced by policy makers and government agencies both in developed and developing countries are discussed.

Course Learning Outcomes
Upon completion of the course, students should be able to: 

• Define key macroeconomic concepts and principles.
• Calculate basic macroeconomic indicators related to GDP and cost of living within a group of countries or individual states.
• Explain how the real economy operates in the long run from production and growth perspectives.
• Explain the role of monetary and fiscal policies to tackle inflation and unemployment.
• Discuss advantages and disadvantages of the open economy.
• Use the concept of aggregate demand and aggregate supply to explain the main facts about economic fluctuations.
• Explain both potential and limits of economic policy aimed at macroeconomic stabilization and long-term economic growth.

Course Assessments and Grading

Course # MDIA 2164

Credits 6

Pre-requisites and Co-requisites: None

Course Description:

This course introduces students to the global audio industry, including its practices and ethics. Students will analyze the role of podcast, radio and audio production and investigate different genres of programming and digital sound production. 

The course provides students with knowledge of media processes and practical skills in media-making techniques. Students will examine these in the context of both new and traditional formats of radio/audio production. This content will be framed within the Central Asian context. Newer forms of audio media and how they are shaping the new landscape including online, web radio, streaming and podcasts. This course builds on concepts first covered in Writing English for Media and is designed as a precursor to the Specialized Media Labs (Radio/Audio) and Specialized Media Labs (Project).

Course Learning Outcomes

Upon completion of the course, students should be able to: 

• Describe the communicative practices, skills and technologies of podcast/radio/ audio production, especially within the Central Asian context.
• Discuss the history and the role played by radio and other audio forms of media in a global context.
• Apply operational, technical and media industry skills related to podcast/radio/audio production and programme making.
• Use the ethical frameworks for podcast/radio/audio production and journalism (in research, interviewing and presentation).
• Produce well designed sound projects for specific purposes and audiences.
• Collaborate in small production teams in order to deliver a podcast/radio/ audio product to a deadline.

Course Assessments and Grading

Course # MDIA 2127

Credits 3

Pre-requisites and Co-requisites: None

Course Description

This course is designed to provide students with grounding in graphic design. It introduces the intricacies of graphic genres and focuses on the importance of design-thinking in various media professions. The goal of the course is to enable students to enhance their creative thinking and visual ideation. The course also includes technical skills in relation to visual design computer programmes through practical workshops. The course will also introduce students to a range of design spheres such as motion picture, TV captions, animation, 3D and web design.

Course Learning Outcomes

Upon completion of the course, students should be able to: 

• Explain the visual design narratives used in a variety of media production projects.
• Apply graphic design principles in the ideation, development, and production of visual messages.
• Create visual design products for diverse communication contexts and audiences.
• Analyze genres, styles and trends in the history of visual design.
• Discuss the dark forces of design and the impact they can have on how messages are communicated to and received by different audiences.

Course Assessments and Gradings

Course # HUSS 1009

Credits 6

Pre-requisites and Co-requisites:

Course Description

This course explores Central Asian history during the colonial and post-colonial period (since circa 1750). It concentrates on the formerly Russian / Soviet areas of Central Asia, such as the three countries in which the University of Central Asia are located, but also explores neighboring areas dominated by China and Britain (Xinjiang, Afghanistan, and to a lesser extent Tibet, Mongolia, and Iran). The course emphasizes links and connections across these political borders, which were at first largely artificial and porous, but which became crucially important and shaped local communities in divergent ways. It emphasizes social and cultural history, as a complement and counterweight to the usual political frameworks and grand narratives of khans, revolutions, and wars. It focuses on questions of personal and communal identity, and how the borders between groups have been defined, what they meant to all sides, and how they changed. Students will learn about everyday life in Central Asia, and how worldviews shifted – especially for men and women outside the royal courts, military leadership, or diplomatic corps.

Course Learning Outcomes

Upon completion of the course, students should be able to: 

• Discuss the key features, facts and frameworks that make up the history of Central Asia since 1750.
• Explore the ways shifting political boundaries and cultural identities are created, through processes that are both historically contingent and cumulative, i.e., layered on top of each other.
• Place Central Asia into an inter-scalar theory of world history, one that can situate local stories of "normal" people in multiple frames, i.e. regional, national, imperial and global.
• Utilize primary and secondary sources to help gain a better grasp of the region and period
• Explain how personal, community and national identities are formed and changed as a result of socio-cultural and political factors
• Improve oral and written communication skills with peers and professors

Course Assessments and Grading

Course # DMNS  2071

Credits 6

Pre-requisites and Co-requisites: None

Course Description

This course is designed to give students a solid basis for furthering their studies related to the biological sciences by striking a balance between mastery of core concepts and exposure to the breadth of the discipline. Students examine the interrelationships between organisms, their biotic and abiotic environments, and the genetic, evolutionary, and ecological processes governing the patterns we observe in nature. By the end of the course, students are expected to apply biological knowledge to new situations and to integrate concepts from multiple sub-disciplines to solve problems and make predictions about biological systems.

Course Learning Outcomes

Upon the completion of the course, students will be able to:

In Genetics:

1. Introduce the sciences, including the scientific method, bioethics, and the fundamental concepts of chemistry and physics that provide a framework within which learners comprehend biological processes.
2. Explain the structures, functions, and processes of the cell, the most basic unit of life.
3. Introduce the earliest experiments that revealed the basis of genetics through the intricacies of DNA to current applications in the emerging studies of biotechnology and genomics.

In Evolution

1. Explain the core concepts of evolution with examples illustrating evolutionary processes.
2. Explain in what way each of the four major mechanisms of evolution (mutation, genetic drift, selection, gene flow) may contribute to adaptation, divergence, speciation and/or extinction.
3. Describe evolutionary processes in the context of genetics.

In Ecology

1. Explore the diversity life by distinguishing specific characteristics of every group of organisms.
2. Discuss emerging phylogenetic relationships and its implication to sustainable ecosystems.
3. Explain the core concepts of botany, plant life and processes.
4. Discuss the form and function of the human (animal) body, including body systems and processes.
5. Explain ecological concepts highlighting localized, real-world issues of conservation and biodiversity that relates to Central Asia.

Course Assessments and Grading

Course # HUSS 2099

Credits 2

Course # HUSS 2082

Credits 0

Pre-requisites and Co-requisites: None

Course description

The purpose of physical education is to strengthen health and develop the physical and mental abilities of students. Physical exercises and sports games are the way to a powerful and functional body, clear mind and strong spirit. The course is both practical and theoretical, it covers basic concepts of anatomy and physiology as well as health and safety requirements.  

Course learning outcomes
Upon completion of the course, students should be able to: 

• Perform a range of physical activities
• Understand health and safety requirements for a range of physical activities
• Describe the role and progress of sport in Central Asia
• Choose an appropriate physical activities programme for their age and gender
• Identify tiredness and its symptoms to control the body during athletic exercises
• Describe the technique of running for a long and a short distance and jumping
• Accomplish running for a short and a long distance and jumping according to all necessary norms
• Describe the rules of a range of sports games

Course Assessments and Grading

Course # COMP 2012E

Credits 2

Course Description

The course focuses on creating computer animation using Blender. The first 7 weeks of lectures and tutorials will cover geometric modelling, motion animation, shading, texturing, and lighting with the Blender computer animation package.

Students will work on their final animation projects in the last 7 weeks, but there may be one or two tutorials on reflection of the environment in shiny or glossy surfaces, and multiple bounce illumination.

There will be a final animation team project, to demonstrate skills with Blender in a creative setting, due for presentation in class during the last class week of the semester.

Course Learning Outcomes

Upon the completion of the course, students will be able to:

• Use surface-based geometric modelling tools for computer aided design.
• Build a character with a skin and skeleton, using Blender.
• Create an animation of a scene that changes in time, with lighting and camera motion.

Course Assessments and Grading

The course will be graded with PASS/FAIL.

Course # COOP 2001

Credits 2