In 1999, as a freshly minted PhD graduate and practising journalist, I was given the extraordinary privilege – call it luck if you like – of designing the University of Sydney’s first media and communications degree. MECO degrees were previously seen as “trade” degrees suitable for teaching only at non Group of Eight universities. But their popularity saw them increasingly integrated into sandstone universities where there was a general wariness about teaching subjects that did not “belong” in the traditional humanities.

Most degrees in the media and communications field at the time were badged as journalism degrees. And journalism had only recently been seen as something worthy of studying at a tertiary level. Journalists, the professional wisdom dictated, learned everything they needed to know in newsrooms, not in ivory towers. I clearly remember being hired at The Sydney Morning Herald fresh out of doing an Arts/Law degree at the University of Sydney and proudly showing the editor my CV. He put it in the bin and told me: “That’s irrelevant. I’m hiring you because you can write.”

It was an era where research-intensive universities were suspicious of offering media and communications degrees, while mainstream media industries were suspicious of their value. The University of Sydney’s MECO degree helped quell those doubts. One of the most important principles that has always grounded teaching in MECO is equipping students with the skills to enter and navigate the volatile media and communications industry sector, and to think critically while doing so.

An excellent humanities education, grounded in a degree that allows students to major in traditional humanities subjects, equips them with the ability to think critically, to research and to communicate clearly and persuasively. It also challenges them to think about the role of journalism and what we now call media content production in our democracy and our society.

Many of our graduates have gone on to have stellar careers in journalism and increasingly in strategic public relations, political communication, public policy and research, and publishing. Today, many of them will also build careers in areas like social media strategy, galleries, libraries, arts and museums, as well as game design and mobile media industries.

A wonderful addition to the MECO discipline was the merger with Digital Cultures, led by Chris Chesher and Kathy Cleland. As media and communications practice and research became increasingly focused on the digital, the complementary program offered by Digital Cultures brought critical analysis of the role of the internet in transforming the media landscape to bear on teaching professional skills and provided students with subjects that helped them navigate the changing media landscape. The merger was also transformative for MECO colleagues in their own research. A longstanding collaboration ensued.

The university sector has also evolved over the past two decades and has increasingly welcomed international students. There is no doubt that local students have benefited from this, as have their international classmates. For my MECO colleagues, integrating the experience and needs of international students was an opportunity to strengthen our focus on the global impact of our teaching and research. In a more concrete sense, teaching a large group of international students alongside local students is a fantastic opportunity to get them talking about how media and communications operate in diverse cultures and political systems.

From the early days, MECO has also been a leader in giving students from a wide variety of backgrounds and cultures access to education. Early on, we implemented an alternative entry pathway for students who did not have high tertiary entrance scores. The University of Sydney has traditionally been associated with students from privileged backgrounds, but in MECO we have always been passionate about social justice and inclusion in our teaching and research. When it comes to journalists and media content producers, it is very clear that diversity is still sorely lacking in Australia, and we are committed to being part of the solution by providing educational pathways for everyone.

The astonishing thing for me, looking back over the history of MECO, is the extraordinary number of brilliant researchers who have worked in the degrees and equally been passionate teachers. I can’t do the roll call, but this book tells the story. We have also produced amazing graduates, many of whom my colleagues and I are still in touch with and actively mentor.

Reading this book, I have been struck by the extraordinary journey of colleagues and students over the first two decades of the history of the Department of Media and Communications. A department that started as a small undergraduate program with high ambitions has grown into one of the most respected media and communications programs in the country, with five postgraduate programs. MECO PhD graduates have gone on to influence the field internationally.

For me, the most wonderful endorsement of the hard work and passionate engagement of my colleagues is when a journalist calls me to set up an interview and says: “You won’t remember me, but I was a MECO student, and the incredible lecturers inspired me to become a journalist. Now, can you talk about your research?”

All of us at MECO remain passionate about both teaching and researching in ways that make a genuine contribution to society and to solving very pressing, big picture problems. Join us. We are good at conversations because we are experts in communication.