RIYADH, 30 August 2007 — A multimedia museum, described as the first of its kind in the Kingdom, has been set up at Imam Muhammad ibn Saud Islamic University’s College of Mass Communications here.
With a separate facility for women and a distance-learning program for those in the armed services, the center represents a major initiative on the part of the university in streamlining the mass communications syllabus in order to stay tuned to the current trends in the field.
“We had to replace 47 of the 51 courses with new ones and introduce state-of-the-art technology in order to give a brand new look to the curriculum,” said Mohammed Al-Heezan, dean of the College of Mass Communications at Imam University.
He said that some of the courses in mass communications were 30 years old and were dealing mainly with historical aspects.
According to Heezan, the revamping of the whole program has had a positive impact on the students, some of whom have already signed job contracts long before their graduation.
“They are working in newspaper offices and advertising agencies as journalists and layout artists. We sent 38 of them as internees in the first batch. Of these, 13 signed contracts with no less than SR5,000 as salary,” he said.
The centerpiece of this effort is the multimedia museum, which traces the evolution of communication back 6,000 years, when messages used to be written on papyrus or inscribed on rocks.
The museum contains copies of letters written by the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) and sent through his emissaries to various rulers. One of them is dated 628 AH. Another noteworthy exhibit is a copy of the Time magazine dated March 8, 1945, with the title cover carrying a photograph of King Abdul Aziz as Man of the Year.
Other exhibits include a microphone invented by Thomas Edison in 1877, an original Marconi Radio and other tools of mass communications of yesteryears. They are in addition to the latest communication devices featuring digital technology and plasma screen technology.
The department is currently handling 23 projects, while the archives consist of about 500 theses and dissertations done by the students. They are available to research scholars for a small fee and can be obtained from the electronic library for dissertations and theses.
Heezan said the university’s multimedia training center has invested around SR8 million in equipping it with the-state-of-the-art communications technology.
“Before our computer lab was poorly equipped. Now we have 140 computers for students’ use,” he said.
On the academic side, the college has launched a new program for women at the graduate level. In order to provide hands-on experience for women, the multimedia-training center is fully equipped with computers, a digital-editing unit, and also the graphics and design unit. There is a separate unit for individual training, especially for members of the academia.
The dean also explained about their long-distance learning program. “We have some students on a part-time basis as they work elsewhere. Those students can download the curriculum from the college website. We have also launched a program for e-government. Our students are required to do a three-month project in the last semester before they graduate. Most of them get jobs immediately in various institutions,” he added.
