Children
Child rights action with informed and engaged societies
Children

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

Time to read
1 minute
Print
a- a+
Read so far

University of the West Indies MA in Communication for Social and Behaviour Change

1 comment

Best wishes. Working with our Partner, Temple University, we have been summarising a range of academic institutions' programmes on communication and media (for) development, social and behavioural change. As someone connected with an academic institutions these are shared for both your information and your review. If you have any questions or comments please do click "Please review ..." below or just reply by email.

The focus below is on the University of the West Indies' Masters in Communication for Social and Behaviour Change. Previously we shared information Ahmadu Bello University in Nigeria's Masters Degreee in Development Communication

We would very much welcome your critique of these courses. Please so share comments, questions, observations and ideas. 

University of the West Indies - MA Communication for Social and Behaviour Change

Some key elements:

  1. Participants are prepared to conceptualise, design, manage and evaluate evidence-based strategic programmes for social and behaviour change
  2. A part-time programme running over two calendar years
  3. Curriculum includes: Behaviour Change and Communication Theories, Research Methods in Communication for Social and Behaviour Change, Academic Reading and Writing in the Study and Analysis of Communication, Social Change and Development Communication, Disasters, Media and Communication, Intervention Design, Caribbean Media and Communication and Society with a Final Research Paper
  4. The core teaching materials include work by Friedman, Melkote, Castelloe et al, White and Freire

There is a substantive summary 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 submit review comments and questions on the very interesting work at the University of the West Indies.

Comments

Submitted by ademchanie on Thu, 12/08/2016 - 00:23 Permalink

Comment on: University of the West Indies MA in Communication for Social and Behaviour Change

The MA program is very interesting and indeed a good move to elevate the place of communication in social change and development. I think the curriclum could be rich enough if some issues/course about the intersection bettween communication and culture is included. This is because this time is the quest for partcipatory era of social change and hence understanding culture specific development paths are very essential.