Contemporary Journalism Graduate Program
For Centennial College
This project is about designing a single online learning experience that works for students from nearly 100 ethnic backgrounds—adapting content, visuals, and interactions to meet diverse cultural and linguistic needs, while maintaining a consistent quality standard across all modules.
Why This Project
The Contemporary Journalism program at Centennial College is a three-semester Ontario College Graduate Certificate program that prepares students for the evolving demands of modern journalism. The program is offered at the Progress Campus.
The program explores new tools, trends, and directions in journalism while maintaining a strong emphasis on sourced, credible, and verifiable storytelling. Students learn in an interactive environment with courses covering news reporting, writing, editing, and visual storytelling, while also exploring social media, mobile and emerging technologies (including virtual reality), multimedia storytelling, and data journalism
The Complexity
Outdated curriculum. The program needed to move beyond traditional formats and teach multimedia, mobile, and data-driven journalism.
Diverse student body. Students came from nearly 100 ethnic backgrounds—a unified learning experience had to work for all of them.
Online delivery. Content had to be migrated from classroom to Brightspace LMS, while keeping the curriculum consistent across two partner institutions.
“The problem wasn’t a lack of content—it was how to teach one curriculum to students from 100 different backgrounds. I designed a flexible learning system that adapted to diversity without compromising consistency.”
What I Did
Tech stack: Brightspace LMS, HTML/CSS/JS, Illustrator, Photoshop, Premiere Pro, After Effects, Adobe Audition
Built a fully functional online program on Brightspace LMS
Designed and developed the full web-based course experience on Brightspace using custom HTML/CSS/JS, creating a cohesive, visually engaging learning environment tailored to students from nearly 100 ethnic backgrounds.
Style Guide System
Designed a customized Style Guide for each course, covering color schemes, typography, banner design, and interactive component standards.
Interaction Decision Grid
I determined the right presentation format for each content type—using accordions for complex processes, flip cards for terminology comparison, GIFs for dynamic demonstrations, and infographics for data visualization.
Accessibility Standards
Applied WCAG 2.1 AA accessibility standards across all modules, ensuring equitable access for students with diverse physical and learning needs—including colour contrast, alt text, and keyboard navigation.
Impact
94% employer satisfaction rate among those hiring Centennial graduates
Toronto Observer—the program's student news platform—ranked best college/university newspaper website in Ontario for two consecutive years
Program serves students from nearly 100 ethnic backgrounds at one of Canada's most multicultural institutions
Graduates pursue careers as reporters, content creators, and media professionals