Courses

Students will design and make their own Artificial Reality game in Unity3D game engine, learning skills such as game design, C# programming, and animation in a highly interactive and exciting process. Students will learn game design fundamentals, which they’ll put into practice in their own virtual world, complete with complex models, props and mechanics. By participating in this course, students train their logic and design skills, and innovative thinking capabilities. After learning about scripts and tools for special effects and AR implementation, students will receive a copy of the game, along with their original designs, so that they can continue creating long after the course has finished.

“We tell ourselves stories in order to live.” Students learn to tell stories, render their experiences, observations, and ideas into words. They learn the fundamentals of creative writing and read and write pieces of fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry. They participate in workshops, an integral component of any college-level creative writing class. The course culminates in a reading at the program final show, as well as the production of a digital literary journal.

An introduction to photography in which students learn to use their camera's manual shutter speed, aperture, and ISO settings to control exposure and effects. They learn composition and lighting, and experiment with angle, framing, lens choice, and exposure. They edit their work in Photoshop, learn about the different new media platforms changing the way we see the world and process information, present their work, and learn how to give and receive criticism. Using LA as their backdrop, they practice different styles of photography. Finally, each student curates a selection of photographs to exhibit in a final show. Students need to bring their own DSLR camera with USB cable, charger, manual, and at least one 8GB memory card.

“In this survey course, students investigate a wide range of psychological topics including dreams, memory, consciousness, anxiety, body language, gender, sexuality, and education. As well as examining the history of the subject, select case histories, and various mental disorders, students are introduced to research methodologies and diverse analytical frameworks in order to design their own experiments. They come away from the course with a better understanding of the career options in this field and possible areas for further research.

From elocution to forming a convincing argument, this course provides students with a practical and diverse range of public speaking skills. Classwork also focuses on preparing and presenting regular debates on a variety of controversial topics related to Los Angeles and the United States. The course culminates in a formal debate judged by a panel.

Using digital technology in all its manifestations (You Tube, Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat etc..) as its tools, the class seeks to determine to what extent society is shaped by technology and to what extent technology shapes society. Analyzing case studies from fields as diverse as sociology, history, the law, philosophy, and engineering, and working with experts, the class attempts to discover whether humanity is entering a new age of organization and relationships – as it did with the invention of movable type print and steam power – or whether it is simply a case of the same old thing with new names. Alongside, the class seeks to determine whether the technologies herald a new age of freedom and dignity or one of censorship and bullying.