The Bachelor of Communication is a three-year specialist degree that will give you expertise in strategic communication, combined with a general understanding of business.

Get the up-to-date industry skills you need to become a public relations or marketing specialist, and go on to an exciting career working in central or local government, private firms, PR/marketing agencies, or not-for-profit organisations.

This degree is an ideal choice if you enjoy talking to people, expressing ideas, being creative, and solving problems.

With the BC degree, you’ll learn how to use the power of writing, speech and images to create engaging content that tells a powerful story about an organisation – through video, websites, social media, and so much more.

Gain the insights to design a communication campaign that can shape people’s beliefs and behaviour, address major social issues (eg. health, the environment), or attract new customers to buy a company's products and services.

Students majoring in Public Relations will develop the professional writing, interpersonal and leadership skills to work with both clients and journalists, and craft media releases that make news headlines. You'll know how to deliver effective communication strategies, build positive relationships with a diverse range of stakeholders, protect an organisation’s reputation from harm, and respond quickly to an emerging crisis.

Marketing majors will understand how to satisfy customers’ needs, build strong brands that stand out from the crowd, conduct market research, and design advertising that really works. You’ll also have the opportunity to build a commercial website and gain Google Analytics certification.

In first year, the core papers of this degree will introduce you to the fundamentals of communication, marketing, business and management. In second year, the paper Communication Consulting will teach you how to conduct in-depth research such as surveys and interviews to clearly understand an organisation’s communication problems.

Then you’ll take more advanced papers focused on your specialist major subject/s, such as events management, crisis communication, professional speaking, media relations, digital marketing and branding, and much more.

Practical industry experience

In the third year, all BC students take a capstone paper on Communication Strategies. You’ll work in teams to deliver a communications/marketing strategy for a client organisation by applying all the theories and practices you’ve learnt in class.

You’ll also complete a work-integrated learning paper, which is a great opportunity to add practical PR or marketing experience to your CV by working on real projects for a host employer.

Why study communication at Waikato?

Waikato's Bachelor of Communication is the only communication degree in New Zealand – and one of only four outside the United States - that is certified by the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA). This is your guarantee of a world-class learning experience, as the PRSA sets the gold standard for PR education.

Waikato is also ranked in the world's top 200 universities for Communication and Media Studies (QS World University Subject Rankings 2019).

You'll be studying at Waikato Management School,which is ranked in the top 1% of all business schools globally with its prestigious Triple Crown Accreditation from EQUIS, AMBA and AACSB.

• Advertising account executive
• Brand and campaign manager
• Communications advisor
• Community engagement manager
• Digital content writer
• Digital strategist
• Creative art director
• Digital marketing specialist
• Documentary film producer
• Events manager
• Film or television producer
• Game designer
• Interactive media artist
• Marketing/sales manager
• Internal communications manager
• Market researcher
• Media relations advisor
• Multimedia journalist
• Podcaster
• Press secretary
• Product category manager
• Producer - film, TV, web series
• Public relations manager
• Social media advisor
• Sound designer
• Sponsorship/fundraising manager
• User experience (UX) designer
• Web designer/developer
• Web editor