Grads sit in seats in Schar Center during graduation.As a nationally accredited program, the School of Communications monitors four indicators of student success: enrollment, retention, graduation and employment.

Enrollment

The School of Communications is home to about 20 percent of Elon’s student body. The school offers seven undergraduate majors: Journalism, Strategic Communications, Cinema & Television Arts, Communication Design, Media Analytics, Sport Management, and Digital Content Management. The Digital Content Management major officially launched in fall 2025.

Program Fall 2024 Fall 2023 Fall 2022 Fall 2021
Undergraduate Programs
Journalism 142 152 172 167
Strategic Communications 386 411 430 474
Cinema & Television Arts 187 202 232 251
Communication Design 166 203 238 214
Media Analytics 71 86 108 117
Sport Management 269 235 200 200
Undergraduate Total 1,221 1,289 1,380 1,423

Retention

Retention refers to the number of students who return to school the following year. One method of determining retention in a major is based on the entering first-year class. Another method is based on the last declared major of all students at the university. This section provides data for both methods of calculation. The Accrediting Council on Education in Journalism and Mass Communications specifies that retention, graduation and employment data be provided for an accredited Communications program.

Retention and Growth Based on Entering First-Year Class

When students are admitted to Elon, they are free to enter the major of their choice, unlike some journalism and communications programs that have their own admission process or restrict students from declaring a major until the junior year. As a result, high school students who express an interest in Communications in their application process to Elon become the entering first-year cohort in Communications.

The chart below shows that 206 students expressed an interest in Communications when they applied and were admitted to Elon in fall 2020. Three years later, 179 of them (86.8%) had become seniors at Elon, with 159 (77.1%) as Communications majors. This means 20 seniors remained at Elon but had switched to other majors since their first year. Meanwhile, an additional 115 students from that first-year class became Communications majors after they began at Elon, resulting in 68 more students being Communications majors in the senior year (274) than in the entering first-year cohort.

A graphic highlighting retention in communication majors.

Source: Elon’s Office of Institutional Research

These tables reflect full-time first-year students entering Elon. They do not include transfer students and count a student (for instance, those who double major) only once. The technical description is “unduplicated, first-time, full-time and first-year students enrolling at the university.” These tables and later ones do not include Sport Management, which is a separate department in the school and not part of the accreditation process.

Retention Based on Last Declared Major

A second method of determining retention in a major is based on the last declared major of all students at the university – both those who eventually graduate from Elon as well as those who leave the university with Communications as their last declared major. This method is used to describe enrollment and retention of Communications majors within the university over time and to calculate graduation rates, as shown in the next section.

The chart below shows retention of students in this cohort in comparison with students in the university overall. Of all first-time, full-time students who entered Elon in 2020, 307 students ultimately declared Communications as their last major in the university. Some entered Elon as first-year students having expressed an interest in Communications, some became Communications majors after starting at Elon, and others were Communications majors when they left the university.

Of the 307 last declared COM major students in entering cohort 2020, 281 (91.5%) returned to Elon the following year, 279 (90.9%) returned to the university by their junior year, and 274 (89.3%) remained and had declared a major in Communication by the end of the senior year.

Class of 2024 Cohort Sophomore Year Junior Year Senior Year
Communications Majors 307 281 (91.5%) 279 (90.9%) 274 (89.3%)
All Elon Students 1,586 1,392 (87.8%) 1,314 (82.8%) 1,273 (80.3%)
Class of 2023 Cohort Sophomore Year Junior Year Senior Year
Communications Majors 342 317 (92.7%) 299 (87.4%) 292 (85.4%)
All Elon Students 1,659 1,487 (89.6%) 1,411 (85.1%) 1,364 (82.2%)
Class of 2022 Cohort Sophomore Year Junior Year Senior Year
Communications Majors 331 318 (96.0%) 305 (92.1%) 303 (91.5%)
All Elon Students 1,698 1,548 (91.2%) 1,466 (86.3%) 1,435 (84.5%)

Source: Elon’s Office of Institutional Research

University retention rates reflect full-time, first-year students in all majors who remain at Elon at the time of fall enrollment each year. Because students may change majors at any time, retention data for Communications majors are based on their declared major at the time of fall enrollment each year.

Graduation

A four-year graduation is the norm for Communications students at Elon.

In the graduating Class of 2024, 262 students graduated as Communications majors in four years. This is 85.3% of all Elon students whose last declared major was Communications.

Graduating Class of 2024 Cohort 4-Year Graduation 5-Year Graduation
Communications Majors 307 262 (85.3%) 268 (87.3%)
All Elon Students 1,586 1,225 (77.2%) N/A
Graduating Class of 2023 Cohort 4-Year Graduation 5-Year Graduation
Communications Majors 342 282 (82.5%) 294 (86%)
All Elon Students 1,659 1,288 (78%) 1,338 (80.7%)
Graduating Class of 2022 Cohort 4-Year Graduation 5-Year Graduation
Communications Majors 331 289 (87.3%) +10 = 299 (90.3%)
All Elon Students 1,698 1,356 (79.9%) 1,412 (83.2%)

Employment

Each year the university conducts a survey of the most recent graduating class, nine months following graduation, to ascertain employment or graduate school status, type of employer, and salary. The report on the Class of 2023 was released by the Student Professional Development Center in spring 2024.

Employment and Graduate School Status, Nine Months After Graduation

Graduating Class 2024 2023 2022
Communications Graduates Employed 80.5% 89.1% 91.4%
Entering Graduate School 14.3% 9.2% 7.2%

A few graduates each year indicate they fit in both categories.

Employment by Organization Type

Communications graduates who are employed are asked each year to indicate the type of organization where they work.

Organization Type 2024 2023 2022
Corporate For Profit 27.4% 75% 80%
Not For Profit 2.7% 6% 2%
Educational 2.2% 7% 3%
Government 2.2% 5% 3%
Entrepreneurial/Self-employed/Start-up 1.6% 8% 3%
Unknown 62.9% N/A N/A

2024 percentages were based on 186 employed graduates (of 231 total respondents) who reported their organization type; 2023 percentages were based on 304 responses; 2022 percentages were based on 278 responses.

Employment Related to Career Goals

In 2024, 34% of the employed Communications graduates who responded to this survey – and this specific question – said their work was related to their career goals. 62% left the question blank; 23% answered “not related.”

Average Salaries

2023 School of Communications graduates reported an average starting salary of $51,637.

— Last updated July 15, 2025


Assessment of Student Learning

Initial plan, 2003; revised 2010, 2016, 2020, 2023

Assessment is the process of determining if students are learning what the faculty intend for them to learn. While grades represent an evaluation of student learning at an individual level, assessment is the evaluation of student learning across the breadth of a program. At its best, assessment has a transformative effect through the cyclical process of analyzing curriculum, instruction and student learning – and then using those findings to improve future student learning. This process requires gathering information from multiple sources to assess what students know, understand and can do as a result of their educational experiences.