Why Communication Education is Important: The Centrality of the Discipline in the 21st Century

This study provides a rationale for the claim that communication instruction is critical to students' future personal and professional success. Thematic analysis of 93 journal and newspaper articles, reports, and surveys provide evidence of the centrality of communication in developing the whole person, improving the educational enterprise, being a responsible social and cultural participant in the world, succeeding in one's career and in business, enhancing organizational processes and organizational life, and, addressing several emerging concerns in the 21st century including health communication, crisis communication, and crime and policing. The results of this study are compared to the themes identified in a similar study published in 2000.