Bachelor of Digital Communications (Honours)

at Humber College - Lakeshore Campus Canada

Humber’s Introduction to Commercial Jazz Music certificate is a performance-based program designed to help you assess and strengthen your skills. It solidifies your knowledge of the fundamentals of western music and develops your current performance skills through the jazz-specific areas of improvisation, repertoire development and small group ensemble performance. You will emerge from the program with a clearer understanding of the field and your own career potential within it, and as a stronger candidate for entry into postsecondary music degree and diploma programs. All courses have a particular focus on the commercial jazz field.

Learning Outcomes

• Upon successful completion of the program, a graduate will:
  • Recognize & identify common styles of music.
  • Describe the commercial/jazz field in terms of tradition, artists, & styles.
  • Explain the contribution of various artists to the development of particular styles & idioms.
  • Analyze the components & performance differences of recorded selections.
  • Play a repertoire of memorized materials that are considered standards in the commercial/jazz field & reflect the various styles inherent in this music.
  • Write diatonic melodies in various styles demonstrating knowledge of relevant harmonic & melodic concepts & structures of form.
  • Perform in an ensemble demonstrating basic ensemble skills such as intonation, tuning, time, feel, balance & dynamics.
  • Identify their own musical strengths & weaknesses in terms of a performance career in the commercial/jazz field.
  • Implement strategies & plans for on-going personal & professional growth & development.
  • Establish a practice of critical self-assessment & professional goal setting.

By combining the latest recording technologies and entrepreneurial business strategies with performance, production, songwriting and composition in jazz, pop, R&B, Latin and world music, you will be well equipped with the knowledge and skills needed for success in today’s music world.

Founded in 1972, the program has consistently produced many of the most successful commercial and jazz musicians in Canada and the world. With more than 350 students and a faculty of 18 full-time and 80 part-time teachers, our program is one of the largest, most diverse and highly regarded programs of its kind in the country. Long known for the strength of its professors, Humber offers you the opportunity to study privately, in classroom situations, and in several of the more than 50 ensembles directed by a who’s who of Canadian music. As Toronto is the centre of Canada’s entertainment industry, Humber attracts the top professionals in jazz, musical theatre, television, film, commercials and pop.

After two years of core music courses, you will continue with lessons on your major instrument, as well as take classes in music production and music business while also choosing from electives in arranging, composition, advanced improvisation, film scoring, music production techniques, songwriting, ethnomusicology or pedagogy.

You’ll develop musicianship and artistry by presenting your own recital, arranging and composing original material, and recording and marketing your own music.
In addition, you will take courses in music history, theory, aural training and improvisation, and have the opportunity to participate in a variety of ensembles.

All students complete a major recording project/portfolio in their fourth year. The assembled portfolio, which includes a complete press kit and professional-quality recording, as well as other promotional materials, functions as your calling card for entrance into the music industry upon graduation.

Learning Outcomes
Upon successful completion of the program, a graduate will:

• Perform, compose, produce music at a professional level for entry to the competitive, global music industry.
• Demonstrate a knowledge of diverse musical styles and contextualize themselves within contemporary music history: specifically defined as the idioms of African American musical genres, mainstream pop music, country/folk music, Latin music, music for musicals and film, art music and jazz.
• Demonstrate, through performance and composition, a technical and musical mastery of harmonic, melodic and rhythmic structures.
• Demonstrate, through performance, an extensive knowledge of contemporary musical repertoire and apply appropriate performance skills in diverse music contexts.
• Compose and arrange in a broad range of contemporary music styles.
• Prepare and present a portfolio of recorded material reflecting a broad range of styles.
• Record, edit and produce a broad range of contemporary music.
• Apply computer applications/music technology skills in composition, arranging and production.
• Critically analyze and evaluate sound recordings and describe their production characteristics.
• Demonstrate, through production and performance, organizational, project management, and implementation skills.
• Demonstrate leadership, teamwork, communication, critical thinking, research and problem-solving skills.
• Demonstrate a working knowledge of contract law, copyright law, intellectual property rights, royalties, and rules of public domain.
• Make use of entrepreneurial music business skills to engage in the competitive contemporary music industry.
• Demonstrate professional “freelance” etiquette relating to job seeking and keeping skills.
• Demonstrate an ability to research and present findings from primary and secondary sources.
• Formulate, articulate and present their own ideas about music, art and society through discussion and writings.
• Demonstrate an artistic awareness and understanding of musical aesthetics.
• Assess personal strengths, musical and business skills, knowledge, artistic vision, interests, and abilities.

Work Placement

• You will participate in a work placement designed to mirror the professional music world, which is largely characterized by contract, freelance and part-time employment. You are responsible for accumulating the equivalent of 420 hours of experience which will allow you to establish contacts and relationships with key companies and industry professionals.

Humber’s Bachelor of Commerce – Management Studies degree program prepares you to take on a variety of managerial roles in many different types of business. The program is based on the seven traditional management functions (planning, organizing, staffing, directing, co-ordinating, reporting and budgeting) and gives you the necessary skills and knowledge to:

• Develop business strategies
• Analyze issues from various perspectives
• Apply classroom work to industry-connected projects
• Integrate transferable skills such as interpersonal interaction, communication and organization to all classroom and project work.

Our program starts with a foundation of business studies in areas such as organizational behaviour, law, economics, finance and accounting, marketing, and operations management. Specialization courses cover all seven management functions along with business research methods and strategic management. You’ll also get hands-on learning that provides both the education and the experience employers look for once you graduate. You’ll be taught by professors who are widely known for their real-world connections and background. Our industry-designed, project-based curriculum gives you the opportunity to take your ideas from concept to execution. In your final year, you will complete a senior-level project, giving you the opportunity to work on a team, problem solve, evaluate strengths and limitations, gather and synthesize data, and make appropriate decisions.

The program requires that you complete 14 weeks/420 hours of paid work in the summer between your sixth and seventh semesters. This gives you the hands-on, real-world experience that employers value. Your work placement will give you the opportunity to explore the field you’d like to work in when you graduate. We will work with employers and our industry partners to help you identify opportunities to pursue.

In every industry and every sector, there is a demand for qualified, effective managers – and that demand is growing. As a graduate of our program, your excellent managerial skills and strong understanding of the domestic business environment will make you a highly marketable employee. When you complete the program, you’ll have the knowledge, skills and hands-on experience necessary to take on an entry-level position in many fields including finance, human resources, marketing/sales and operations/logistics. Your degree will help accelerate your career advancement. If you have an entrepreneurial spirit, you’ll be well-positioned to start your own business. And if you want to explore further studies, you’ll be able to pursue graduate studies or industry designations.

Humber’s Bachelor of Commerce – Fashion Management degree program is designed for students interested in the business side of fashion and offers management courses tailored specifically to the fashion industry.

Our program starts with a foundation of business studies in areas such as organizational behaviour, law, economics, finance and accounting, marketing, and operations management. Specialized courses in the fashion management curriculum include twentieth-century fashion history, trend forecasting, retail and wholesale management, brand management, store planning and merchandising, global sourcing, and retail finance.

You’ll gain practical skills through applied projects during which you’ll develop processes and products from the idea stage through to execution. You will also develop business plans and apply your classroom learning to fashion industry analysis, financial management and e-commerce assignments that simulate the latest challenges in the fashion industry.

Learning Outcomes

• Upon successful completion of the program, a graduate will:
  • Explain key theories and concepts in textiles, colour, trends and fashion history.
  • Compare and contrast the Canadian and international fashion industries.
  • Use various problem solving and empowerment approaches, inquiry, analytics and research methods and creative strategies to inform marketing, supply chain, operations and business decisions.
  • Evaluate marketing and sales strategies and assess their impact on consumers and the achievement of business goals.
  • Formulate business strategies that assess costs, benefit, risks, opportunities and that address organizational goals and external trends.
  • Use persuasive language, evidence-based arguments and active listening to communicate effectively with individuals, team members and/or business with diverse skills, expectations and behaviours.
  • Communicate effectively in oral, written, digital and visual forms, appropriate to external and internal stakeholders.
  • Acknowledge ambiguity and uncertainty of the fashion industry.
  • Work effectively within increasingly diverse and dynamic environments integrating leadership attributes with a global mindset.
  • Conduct sustainable fashion management business with consideration for environmental, human and financial issues.

Work Placement
The program requires that you complete 14 weeks/420 hours of paid work in the summer between your sixth and seventh semesters. This gives you the hands-on, real-world experience that employers value. Your placement will give you the opportunity to explore the field you’d like to work in when you graduate. We will work with employers and our industry partners to help you identify opportunities to pursue.

Humber’s Introduction to Commercial Jazz Music certificate is a performance-based program designed to help you assess and strengthen your skills. It solidifies your knowledge of the fundamentals of western music and develops your current performance skills through the jazz-specific areas of improvisation, repertoire development and small group ensemble performance. You will emerge from the program with a clearer understanding of the field and your own career potential within it, and as a stronger candidate for entry into postsecondary music degree and diploma programs. All courses have a particular focus on the commercial jazz field.

Learning Outcomes

• Upon successful completion of the program, a graduate will:
  • Recognize & identify common styles of music.
  • Describe the commercial/jazz field in terms of tradition, artists, & styles.
  • Explain the contribution of various artists to the development of particular styles & idioms.
  • Analyze the components & performance differences of recorded selections.
  • Play a repertoire of memorized materials that are considered standards in the commercial/jazz field & reflect the various styles inherent in this music.
  • Write diatonic melodies in various styles demonstrating knowledge of relevant harmonic & melodic concepts & structures of form.
  • Perform in an ensemble demonstrating basic ensemble skills such as intonation, tuning, time, feel, balance & dynamics.
  • Identify their own musical strengths & weaknesses in terms of a performance career in the commercial/jazz field.
  • Implement strategies & plans for on-going personal & professional growth & development.
  • Establish a practice of critical self-assessment & professional goal setting.

Humber’s Child and Youth Care advanced diploma program prepares you to promote the optimal development of children, youth and their families. Students are required to develop skills in assessing needs, designing and implementing programs and planned environments, and using daily life events to support and facilitate positive change. The program provides foundational knowledge in infant, child and adolescent development; child and youth care relational practice principles; psychology of the family; evidence-based or evidence-informed intervention strategies; group dynamics; and therapeutic activities.

You will learn that an essential component of professional practice is self-awareness, with many courses emphasizing self-reflection and the classroom being a professional practice environment. Your high energy level and emotional maturity will help you meet the demands of working with children and youth with complex needs.

Our program is delivered by award-winning faculty, renowned in their field, with current, relevant experience and advanced degrees. A key feature of the program is its therapeutic play lab fostering experiential learning.
Work Placement
Field placements with established partnerships are a critical component of this program. There is an exciting variety of innovative and traditional field placements available in and around the Greater Toronto Area. Field placements can also be arranged in your own community and are unpaid.

For the first field placement, opportunities are often school-based and occur two days a week for fourteen weeks. For the final two placements, you will be able to submit four to six placement choices with the school making the final decision. These field placements run four days per week.

Humber’s Developmental Services Worker (DSW) diploma program teaches you skills to effectively promote the physical, mental and emotional health of individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

Our faculty team consists of developmental services professionals who are active in the field, and our small class sizes allow for individualized attention. Our curriculum is designed with input from developmental services field experts, ensuring courses are current and relevant.

Your studies begin by learning the stages of human development, the types of developmental disabilities and the range of available community support services for this population. Next, you’ll learn intervention techniques, person-centered planning, abnormal psychology/dual diagnosis, basic pharmacology, supporting people with autism and other complex needs, augmentative forms of communication, and effective responses to people who have been abused. Finally, you’ll develop skills in building interpersonal relationships and counselling. 

You’ll also build your expertise in our counselling labs which provide an ideal setting to develop competencies for working with individuals with limited verbal skills.

Work Placement
Our program offers a rich diversity of innovative and traditional work-integrated learning opportunities. You will complete 568 hours of experiential education with three separate community partners over the duration of the program.

After consulting with you regarding your interests and preferences, your field placement co-ordinator will refer you to specific agencies for these unpaid work experiences.

Field placements run for 14 weeks in Semester 2 of the first year. Students are required to complete 168 hours in this time. Placements are two days per week. Internships take place during fourth semester of second year. Students are required to complete 400 hours with two different employers, four days per week for 14 weeks.

Humber’s Comedy: Writing and Performance diploma program helps you develop your craft while gaining an understanding of the commercial side of the industry. Our faculty is comprised of seasoned, award-winning professionals who are active in the comedy industry. You’ll learn stand-up, improvisation, scriptwriting, sketch comedy and all other aspects of the craft. In addition, the program’s strong alumni network supports you through reunion shows, business opportunities and continued coaching. The program features many mainstage class shows, weekly Humber student shows at Yuk Yuk’s Comedy Club and Comedy Bar, and an organized showcase at Second City Toronto for scouts, directors and agents with students included on the basis of merit. Upon graduation, you will have the tools you need to embark on an exciting career in one of North America’s fastest growing industries: comedy.

Learning Outcomes:
Upon successful completion of the program, a graduate will:

• Produce a variety of comedic materials including sketches, screenplays, sitcoms and variety shows.
• Prepare and perform stand-up comedy routines.
• Discover their comedic voices and create materials that stem from these voices.
• Study both dramatic and comedic performance techniques, and apply those techniques to their own work.
• Prepare written humorous materials for magazines and newspapers as well as for radio broadcasts.
• Practice individual and ensemble comedic performances both in the classroom and in comedy centres.
• Apply the technical requirements of all genres of comedic writing.
• Respond to improvisation demands and create characters quickly on stage.
• Evaluate the business of comedy and develop career strategies and contacts.
• Learn from well-known North American comedic writers and performers and network with those individuals.

From resolving community disputes, labour grievances and employment-standards complaints to representing clients in the civil justice system, our well-rounded Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) graduate certificate program benefits those wanting to be better conflict resolution facilitators, as well as agents representing parties in various dispute resolution processes.

With a core curriculum spanning community mediation, administrative tribunals, labour law, family law, conflict resolution in healthcare and conflict management system design, the program uses intensive workshop training and community engagement to teach the core principles of negotiation, mediation and arbitration. Applying these principles, participants learn to resolve disputes between individuals, businesses, stakeholders in the health sector, government agencies and within families.

It is an ideal program for recent university graduates wanting to enhance their academic credentials, as well as those currently employed in areas such as law, human resources, healthcare, education, social work, real estate and government. Students have the opportunity to apply the theory and skills they’ve learned at Humber's on-campus Dispute Resolution Clinic. Students gain practical experience through a mandatory four-week work placement (160 hours).

Humber’s Bachelor of Creative Advertising degree program will give you the solid foundation necessary for a variety of advertising careers. A wide range of courses cover important topics in digital marketing, communications, copywriting, promotion, persuasion and typography. Many instructors have significant and ongoing industry experience and will help you develop head-turning creative approaches to advertising.

Our program is enriched by opportunities to work in BuildingF, our in-house creative shop, giving you the chance to work on briefs for real clients while gaining valuable experience, connections and skills. With instruction in industry-standard design and production software, marketing and business principles, and content development and production, you will have a thorough understanding of contemporary advertising and insights into its future. Throughout this program, you will work in creative teams and gain the collaborative skills that will prepare you for the agency workplace.

The program is designed to offer you the flexibility to choose an area of focus, be it account management, art direction or copywriting. Should you find an avenue that suits you, you can immerse yourself in Humber’s advertising graduate certificate programs and continue to hone your abilities and marketability.

Learning Outcomes:

Upon successful completion of the program, a graduate will:

• Discuss key historical influences on current practices in creative advertising
• Identify relevant legal, regulatory and ethical considerations that apply to specific advertising areas
• Analyze the social, cultural, political, economic and technological influences on consumer behaviours
• Conduct effective primary and secondary research to derive insights applicable to advertising or marketing issues
• Employ a variety of creative strategies to generate ideas for solving advertising or marketing problems
• Create a campaign to solve an identified business challenge that influences the attitudes and behaviours of a described target audience
• Develop a targeted creative brief informed by insightful interpretations of marketing demographic and user experience research
• Contribute to a creative advertising team using acquired specialized competencies in one of creative strategy, art direction, or copywriting
• Express concepts, ideas, information, brand stories and research insights presented through refined verbal and visual techniques appropriate to the audience
• Questions assumptions and biases through listening, reading and observing critically
• Self-assess continuously to appreciate the lessons available in failure and the place of critique in the improvement process
• Collaborate effectively in team environments to achieve identifiable goals
• Employ entrepreneurial skills and thinking to identify market opportunities.
• Develop a showcase portfolio to represent industry ready competency in creative advertising

Work Placement
Students will gain practical, hands-on experience in the industry by completing a mandatory work placement in the winter semester of 4th year. As students are often hired directly from their placements, the final summer term is fully online.