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After nearly 28 years, The Communication Initiative (The CI) Global is entering a new chapter. 

Following a period of transition, the global website has been transferred to the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in South Africa, where it will be administered by the Social and Behaviour Change Communication Division. Wits' commitment to social change and justice makes it a trusted steward for The CI's legacy and future. 

On the transfer, co-founder Victoria Martin expressed her pleasure to see this work continue under Wits' leadership, knowing that co-founder Warren Feek (1953–2024) would have felt deep pride in The CI Global's Africa-led direction. 

As Wits, we honour the team and partners who sustained The CI for decades and look forward building from that strong base. This includes co-founders Warren Feek (1953-2024) and Victoria Martin as well as La Iniciativa de Comunicación (CILA), which continues independently at lainiciativadecomunicacion.com with links to The CI Global site. We are also eager to forge new partnerships and entertain new ideas as we consider how best to contribute to social and behaviour change in our rapidly evolving environment.

If you are joining the International Social and Behaviour Change Communication (SBCC) Summit in Panama, please join Wits and CILA on Monday, 22 June, to share your thoughts and suggestion for the relaunch of the Communication Initiative. We will be in Pacifica 5 from 12-1:25 for the Refuel, Reflect, and Renew Lunch Series: The Communication Initiative: celebrating a driving force for Communication for Social Change and the way forward. We will reflect on the legacy of Warren Feek and family in creating the Communication Initiative, consider the contributions of CI over the years and then turn our attention towards the future in this dynamic session. 

If you are unable to join us in Panama, we still want to hear from you. Please contribute your thoughts by following this link: https://redcap.link/CommunicationInitiative2026 or reaching out to ci_surveys@commint.com. 

You can also follow the QR Code:

 https://redcap.link/CommunicationInitiative2026

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Master of Public Health in the Field of Social and Behaviour Change Communication - University of the Witwatersrand

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Master of Public Health in the Field of Social and Behaviour Change Communication - University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa

As someone connected with an academic institution, below is shared for both your information and your review. If you have any questions or comments to share please do click "Please review ..." below or just reply by email. We would very much welcome your critique of these courses. Please so share your comments, questions, observations and ideas.

Some key elements of the University of the Witwatersrand's Master of Public Health in the Field of Social and Behaviour Change Communication

  1. Seek to build skills needed to design programmes and interventions to address determinants of health and disease at multiple levels.
  2. Uses a block-release format, which enables part-time students to maintain jobs while also studying.
  3. Five field-specific courses - for example: Planning and Implementing Social and Behaviour Change Communication Programmes; and, Communication, Media and Society
  4. Seven core courses - for example Health and Society - covers the social determinants of health and Research protocol module - leads students through the design of their own research protocol.
  5. Active practitioners, such as Soul City are directly involved in teaching.
  6. There are 18 faculty publications at the core of the course including, for example -  Christofides N.J., Nieuwoudt S, Usdin S, Goldstein S, Fonn S. A South African university-practitioner partnership to strengthen capacity in social and behaviour change communication. Glob Health Action. 2013;6:19300; and, Usdin, S. Christofides, N. “Children can’t wait” Social Mobilization to Secure Children’s Rights to Social Security, in The Handbook of Global Health Communication edited by Obregon, R. & Waisbord, S. 2012, Wiley-Blackwell: Malden, Massachusetts.

There is a substantive summary of this course at this link with more details.

Very much hope that this is helpful and interesting. We will share more courses over the coming weeks.

Please do share your review comments and questions on the very interesting work at the Witwatersrand University.

Background Note: Working with one of our Partners, Temple University, we have been summarising a range of academic institutions' programmes on communication and media (for) development, social and behavioural change. There has been a previous focus on the University of the West Indies' Masters in Communication for Social and Behaviour Change and Ahmadu Bello University in Nigeria's Masters Degreee in Development Communication