Professional Writing

Program Overview

The Master's program in Professional Writing at the University of Cincinnati offers specialized training in technical, business, and health writing. It emphasizes interdisciplinary communication and equips students with cross-genre writing skills, software competencies, and practical experience through service-learning and internships. Graduates pursue careers in fields such as technical writing, healthcare communications, digital marketing, and instructional design.

Program Outline

Degree Overview:

The Master of Arts in Professional Writing program at the University of Cincinnati offers coursework in various forms of specialized writing, including technical, business, and health. The program emphasizes the theory and practice of communication processes bridging disciplines and industries. It aims to equip students with cross-genre skills in information and instructional design, web content development and design, project management, and user-testing. Students develop competencies in appropriate software and gain experience in writing and editing articles, promotional material, grant proposals, reports, creating digital and social media, interacting with various specializations and research methods. The program is designed for both full-time and part-time students, including recent graduates of BA or BS programs in English, communication, graphics, the sciences, and other fields, as well as working professionals seeking to enhance their careers, improve their chances for promotion, or become credentialed in a different field.

Teaching:

Courses are taught by award-winning full-time faculty who have experience outside the classroom. The program emphasizes an innovative approach to service-learning, stressing students' roles as professional consultants and collaborative team-members. The internship requirement provides students with the opportunity to put classroom work into practice.

Careers:

The program prepares graduates for a variety of professional routes, including technical writing, medical writing, advertising, marketing/corporate communications, e-learning development, website design, and content management. Job titles for recent graduates include distance learning coordinator, health communicator, proposal writer, project manager, technical writer, editor, content specialist, instructional designer, and digital marketing specialist.

Other:

The program maintains two computer labs with high-end software for web authoring, document design, production of online tutorials, and other major professional-writing tasks. Job placement of graduates typically reaches 100% within three months after graduation. Students are not expected to have extensive computer experience before entering the program, but may need to spend extra time to develop competencies.