Elective Initiatives
About our elective initiatives
At the Stan Richards School, students can create their own area of emphasis to bridge the gap between academia and industry and allow for greater depths of study. Current concentrations include Texas Strategy, Texas Creative, Texas Immersive, Texas Media & Analytics and Texas Strategy. Learn more about each path below.
Paths to choose from
Texas Creative
Celebrating its 45th anniversary in 2024, this program is designed to develop students with the characteristics that define success as art directors and copywriters. The Texas Creative curriculum stresses big-idea branding, conceptual thinking, collaboration and creative development through a series of selective courses and seminars: Beginning, Intermediate and Advanced Portfolio Development, Capstone Portfolio, Copywriting, Art Direction and many other frequent offerings. They are the future copywriters, creative strategists, art directors, and a billion other titles, but at their core they are creatives and here we train some of the world’s best.
Texas Immersive
Texas Immersive is an interdisciplinary specialization focused on four key areas: Audience – Story – Technology – Innovation. Developing these competencies will foster deep emotional connections, create lasting impact and prepare our students to take on real-world challenges. Overall, students will learn to become Experience Designers... those who understand how to target and build stronger relationships with audiences; tell stories and drive meaningful interactions in a connected environment; and create strong franchises using audience-centric activation models.
Texas Media & Analytics
Texas Media & Analytics is about both critical thinking and creating real-time, intense classroom experiences with real brand situations and data. We employ market simulations and require valuable industry certifications. We support students as they pursue industry level exposure, internships, fellowships, and other opportunities. We regularly compete and win national and international competitions. We take on important primary research challenges, and individually mentor each student along their path.
Texas Public Relations
The Texas Public Relations Program provides students with a blend of practical skills and theoretical rigor essential for a diverse range of career opportunities in the field of public relations. The curriculum is committed to delivering an unparalleled educational experience, focusing on the critical role that public relations plays in building and maintaining relationships between organizations and their publics through effective communication strategies and deliberate actions. Students completing this program may qualify for a broad spectrum of career opportunities, including Corporate Communicator, Social Media Strategist, Media Relations Specialist, Crisis Management Specialist, Corporate Social Responsibility Specialist, and Employee Communication Specialist.
*Note, this initiative is only open to students in the MA program.
Texas Strategy
Texas Strategy transforms students into strategic analysts and data storytellers who are equipped with the sound analytical reasoning needed to succeed in today’s data-focused advertising industry. Students will create, implement, and measure the success of data informed digital advertising strategies in the social media, search, and display spaces using a variety of analytics and software tools. This curriculum requires students to work collaboratively to generate creative analytical solutions by uncovering notable consumer and campaign insights from B2B and B2C datasets. Students will learn to effectively communicate and visualize insights so that opportunities for campaign optimizations can be easily.
*Note, this initiative is only open to students in the MA program.