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Embarking on an academic journey is an exciting endeavor, and choosing the right degree program can set the stage for a fulfilling and successful career. If you're drawn to the art of effective communication, Seaver College’s undergraduate communication studies program might be the perfect fit for you.

Explore the benefits of pursuing a communications degree and the diverse career paths it can lead to while learning about some of the unique strengths of Pepperdine's undergraduate program.

Benefits of a Communications Degree

At the heart of a communications degree lies the development of versatile skills that are applicable across various industries. The undergraduate communication studies program at Seaver College goes above and beyond by offering a comprehensive curriculum that covers a wide range of communication theories, techniques, and practical applications. From public speaking and writing to digital media production and strategic messaging, you'll gain a well-rounded skill set that's highly sought after in today's job market.

One of the key advantages of Pepperdine's program is the opportunity for internships and networking. The university's location near Los Angeles, a hub for media and communication, provides students with access to a wealth of internships and networking events. These experiences are invaluable in building connections and gaining practical skills.

The communication studies program at Pepperdine fosters problem-solving and critical thinking abilities, essential for navigating today's complex world. You'll learn how to analyze and address communication challenges, making you a valuable resource in any organization.

The ability to communicate effectively is a skill highly sought after in the job market. With a degree in communication studies, you'll excel in public speaking, writing, interpersonal relations, and more. These skills are essential in leadership roles and when working in diverse teams.

The beauty of a communications degree lies in its versatility, opening doors to a wide array of career paths. Seaver College communication studies graduates have gone on to excel in fields such as public relations, journalism, marketing, corporate communication, and advertising.

Whether you envision yourself crafting compelling narratives, shaping public opinion, or creating impactful multimedia content, a communications degree equips you with the skills to thrive in a rapidly evolving professional landscape. Below are a few examples of potential careers and the work they do:

1. Public Relations Specialist

Communicate on behalf of organizations to build and maintain a positive image, handle crises, and manage media relations.

2. Advertising and Marketing

Create compelling messages and campaigns to influence consumer behavior and promote products and services.

3. Digital Marketing

Navigate the ever-evolving online landscape, using digital platforms to connect with target audiences.

4. Event Planning

Plan and execute events ranging from corporate conferences to social gatherings.

5. Media and Journalism

Report the news, produce content, or work behind the scenes in media production.

6. Human Resources

Bridge the gap between employees and management, ensuring effective internal communication.

Choosing a degree program is a pivotal decision, and opting for a communications degree at Pepperdine University offers a wealth of benefits that extend far beyond the classroom. With a robust curriculum, hands-on learning opportunities, industry-connected faculty, tailored specializations, and a plethora of career pathways, you'll be well-prepared to make a lasting impact in the world of communication.

Are you ready to embark on a journey of personal and professional growth? Consider Pepperdine University's communication studies program and watch as the world of communication unfolds its endless possibilities before you. Your success story begins here.

MALIBU, Calif. — The three toughest teams in the conference will go head-to-head this week as the Pepperdine women's volleyball team treks down the coast for a PCH Cup battle against LMU and a matchup against San Diego. The Waves are currently ranked atop the West Coast Conference standings, while LMU and San Diego are in the two and three spots respectively.

MATCH #18 — Thursday (October 19) at Gersten Pavilion in Los Angeles, Calif.: Pepperdine (11-6, 7-0 WCC) vs. Loyola Marymount (14-4, 7-1 WCC) at 7 p.m. | ESPN+ ($)

MATCH #19 — Saturday (October 21) at Jenny Craig Pavilion in San Diego, Calif.: Pepperdine vs. San Diego (10-7, 6-1 WCC) at 12 p.m. | ESPN+ ($)

UP NEXT — Next week, the Waves return home to host Saint Mary's on October 26.

SOCIAL MEDIA — Follow @WavesVolleyball on Twitter for updates and check out PepperdineWaves.com and Facebook (/WavesVolleyball) for releases and more information. Find the Waves on Instagram @peppvolley.

ESPN+ — This week, the matches will stream live on ESPN+. Throughout the season, all of Pepperdine's home matches will be available on ESPN+. The West Coast Conference and ESPN have expanded their longstanding media rights relationship. In addition to showcasing more than 25 games on ESPN's linear networks, ESPN+ will serve as the new, exclusive digital home for more than 900 conference events each year.

ADDITIONAL COVERAGE — Live stats for all matches will be available with links found on PepperdineWaves.com.

THE STREAK — After a 1-6 start to the 2023 campaign, the Waves have rallied tough, winning the team's last 10-consecutive matches including eight in straight sets. Pepperdine has not lost a set since September 23, having won the last 17-straight sets played. The last time the team dropped a match was on September 8. The current streak is the longest since the Waves won 13-straight in 2011 to open WCC play off.

WEEKLY HONORS — Junior Grace Chillingworth earned the first West Coast Conference weekly accolade of the season for the Waves this week, picking up the offensive nod after helping the team to a solid sweep over Santa Clara last week. It was the third career honor of its kind for Chillingworth.

She marked a solid 18 kills with only one error on 33 swings for a career-high .515 success rate, averaging 6.00 kills/set throughout the match. Chillingworth finished the match with 18.5 total points, averaging 6.2 points/set for Pepperdine. She also made an impact defensively, amassing eight digs and a block to average 2.67 digs and 0.33 blocks per set. The pin picked up 12 successful receptions without a single error as well.

SQUAD GOALS — The Waves have gone 11-6 this season, but have won the last 10-straight matches, including a 7-0 start to West Coast Conference play. Pepperdine produces 12.93 kills/set on a .256 clip, with 12.11 assists, 1.53 aces, 13.86 digs and 2.22 blocks per set. The team allows opponents 12.88 kills/set on a .208 success rate, while adding 12.05 assists, 1.30 aces, 13.89 digs and 1.81 blocks per set.

Grace Chillingworth, Birdie Hendrickson and Meg Brown lead the Waves with 3.60, 2.91 and 2.41 kills/set respectively. The trio also lead at the service line for the team, alongside ace leader Riley Patterson who has amassed 18 aces and 0.32 aces per set. Chillingworth added 17 aces (0.30), Brown posted in 16 aces (0.35) and Hendrickson has amassed 15 aces (0.28). Patterson also leads the defensive efforts with 3.70 digs/set, while Hendrickson and Chillingworth produce 2.57 and 1.98 digs/set respectively. Isabel Zelaya has a team-high 10.12 assists/set and has posted 577 total assists this season thus far. At the net, Brown has a team-high 1.02 blocks with 47 blocks including five solo rejections, while Vanessa Polk has a team-best 54 blocks including 10 solo rejections to average 0.96 blocks/set.

LAST WEEK — Pepperdine swept past Santa Clara at home last week, posting 25-18, 25-16 and 25-16 set scores. The Waves put in 51 kills on a .375 clip, while adding six aces, 52 digs and 5.0 blocks. The opposition was good for 35 kills on a .207 output with one ace, 45 digs and 5.0 blocks as well. Chillingworth led the pack with 18 kills on a .515 clip, while adding eight digs. Meg Brown also produced double-figure kills with 12 kills on a .625 success rate. She led the team with five blocks. Birdie Hendrickson and Riley Patterson put in a team-best three aces, while Patterson led with 16 digs and Hendrickson amassed 13. Isabel Zelaya led in playmaking duties with 42 assists.

THE COMPETITION — LMU has gone 14-4 overall this season, with a 7-1 start to league action, dropping their only WCC match to the Waves earlier this season. The Lions sit at an untarnished 6-0 at home and are currently on a six-match winning streak. Last week, LMU also bested Santa Clara in four sets, while besting San Diego in four sets as well. Pepperdine leads by an impressive 63-26 all-time, dating back to 1976 when the Waves won 3-0. The Waves went 17-1 against the Lions from 1984-91 and the longest LMU winning streak was five matches from 1994-96. In the most recent years, the Waves have gone 9-2 against the Lions since 2018, though LMU's pair of wins both came in four-set decisions last season. Earlier this season, Pepperdine beat LMU in four sets.

San Diego has gone 10-7 this season with a 6-1 record in conference action, dropping only to LMU among league opponents. The Toreros started off WCC play with five-straight wins before falling to the Lions last week. The team also swept past San Francisco on Saturday. Pepperdine leads San Diego all-time 44-36, beginning in 1979 when the Waves won the first match in straight sets. The Waves won the first 20-consecutive matches against the Toreros through 1993 before USD won five-straight through 1995. In recent years since 2018, USD has gone 6-4 against the Waves, including a pair of four-set wins last season.

4,000 ASSIST CLUB — Graduate student setter Isabel Zelaya entered the exclusive 4,000 assist club during the first week of the season. She entered the 2023 campaign with 3,995 assists and after the 17 matches now sits at 4,572 assists. That mark puts her second in the Pepperdine women's volleyball record books, the fifth Wave all-time to have surpassed the 4,000-assist mark and the first since 2009. Becci Roehl (1994-97) leads the category with 5,020 assists all-time. This season, Zelaya has passed Kiah Fiers (2006-09) with 4,410 assists and Melissa Mehlhorn (2002-05) with 4,387 career assists.

MALIBU, Calif. — Hosting the Intercollegiate Tennis Association Southwest Regional tournament for the third straight season, the Pepperdine men's tennis team will be back in action at the Ralphs-Straus Tennis Center from Thursday, Oct. 19 through Monday, Oct. 23.

Matches from Oct. 19-21 will begin at 9 a.m. PT with doubles play first, then singles. The matches from Oct. 22 and 23 will begin at 10 a.m. PT. Live stats and a live stream for matches on courts 1-6 will be provided via PlaySight; all relevant links can be found on the men's tennis schedule page on pepperdinewaves.com. Admission is free to the public.

Fifteen schools, including the hosting Pepperdine Waves, will compete in the Southwest Regionals over the next five days. The Southwest Regional field is one of the more competitive ones in the nation: Seven of the 15 schools were ranked in the top 50 of the final ITA team poll last season.

SCOUTING THE WAVES

Four Pepperdine players will compete in both singles and doubles this week: Linus Carlsson Halldin, George Davis, Maxi Homberg and Edward Winter. Additionally, both Pepperdine doubles teams — Homberg/Winter and Carlsson Halldin/Davis — received first-round byes; start times for both matches have not been determined.

Over in singles, underclassmen Homberg (Freising, Germany) and Winter (Adelaide, Australia) will receive first-round byes on Thursday morning.

Kicking off the singles action for the Waves, Davis (London, England) will face San Diego State senior Andre Saleh at noon on Thursday. Saleh is looking for his first singles win of the fall season, while Davis is looking to start a new winning streak after going 2-1 at the San Diego Veterans Tennis Classic last week.

Also playing at noon on Thursday is Carlsson Halldin (Stockholm, Sweden), who will play another Aztec: junior Mathieu Josserand. Carlsson Halldin, who has made noticeable strides in the fall season thus far, was last in action at the ITA All-American Championships earlier this month in Tulsa, Okla. There, the redshirt sophomore played his way into the qualifying singles draw, upset #54 Alex Petrov of Illinois for his first ranked win of the season and went 5-1 in his four-day stint.

Winter, who is the 15-seed in the singles tournament, will play the winner of Lennart Melzer of San Diego State and Pablo Carretoro Salvedor of GCU on Thursday at 3 p.m. Neither potential opponent is ranked, yet Winter has notched two wins over ranked singles players this fall.

Homberg, meanwhile, will face either UCSD freshman Zachary Pellouchoud or UCSB's Conrad Brown — a sophomore who played on the back half of the Gauchos' Big West Championship squad last year.

THURSDAY'S MATCHES

Singles Round of 128 Carlsson Halldin (PEPP) vs. Josserand (SDSU), Noon G. Davis (PEPP) vs. Saleh (SDSU), Noon

Singles Round of 64 Homberg (PEPP) vs. Pellouchoud (UCSD)/Brown (UCSB), 3 p.m. Winter (PEPP) vs. Melzer (SDSU)/Carretero Salvador (GCU), 3 p.m.

FOLLOW: Follow @PeppTennis on Facebook and X for immediate updates, results and more. Go to pepperdinewaves.com for all information, releases and schedules.

SAN DIEGO, Calif. — Competing in its penultimate fall tournament, the Pepperdine women's tennis team heads south to San Diego for the ITA Southwest Regionals, held at the University of San Diego and San Diego State from Oct. 19-23.

Singles action starts on Thursday, Oct. 19 at San Diego State, while doubles will begin on Friday, Oct. 20 at both the University of San Diego and SDSU. Matches will be livestreamed via TrackTennis and scores will be updated to the tournament's page on the ITA website when available. All pertinent links can be found on the women's tennis team's schedule page at pepperdinewaves.edu.

SCOUTING THE WAVES

The ITA Southwest Regional tournament marks the first time in the fall season that Savannah Broadus, Anna Campana, Nikki Redelijk and Janice Tjen will all compete for the Waves. And, in a testament to Pepperdine's skill and depth, all four Waves received first-round byes in the women's singles draw.

Tjen (Jakarta, Indonesia) and Broadus (Carrollton, Texas) — the top two overall seeds, respectively — highlight the Waves' singles players. Making her fall debut, preseason #11 singles player Tjen will face off against either Natalie Duffy of Cal State Fullerton or Peppi Ramstedt of Long Beach State on Thursday afternoon. Neither player made the ITA preseason singles rankings.

On the other side of the bracket, Broadus looks to carry momentum from her ITA All-American Championships stint two weeks ago. In Cary, N.C. earlier this month, Broadus picked up two wins against nationally-ranked singles players — including an upset win over #5 Reese Brantemeier of defending national champions North Carolina. The Pepperdine junior, who checked in at No. 23 in the ITA preseason singles rankings, will face the winner of UC Irvine's Kayla Meraz and Hawai'i's Sheena Masuda tomorrow at 3 p.m.

Elsewhere in singles, graduate senior Campana (Hillsborough, Calif.) will receive a first-round bye and face the winner of LMU's Isabella Tcherkes-Zade and UCSD's Gabriella Pachl. Campana has had a productive fall season thus far; she was the consolation singles winner at the Battle in the Bay tournament, plus she played her way into the qualifying draw at the ITA All-American Championships in Cary, N.C.

Senior Nikki Redelijk — the #83 singles player in the nation — rounds out the first-round byes for the Waves. She'll take on either Kelly Leung of UC San Diego or Dania Deaifi of GCU — coincidentally, the team the Waves beat in the first round of the NCAA Tournament this past spring. Redelijk is the 6-seed in this week's singles tournament.

Additionally, all four players will compete in doubles.

As the nation's No. 1 doubles team, Broadus and Tjen will make their season debut after earning a first-round bye on Friday. Their run begins at USD on 10 a.m. against the winner between CSUN's team Tallia Harper and Emma Moratalla Sanz, and Arizona's Lauren Friedman and Tanvi Narendran. Elsewhere in doubles, Campana and Redelijk will take on UC Irvine's Cydney Yamamoto and Nour Khayat at SDSU on Friday at 9:30 a.m.

THURSDAY'S MATCHES

Singles Round of 64 #11 Tjen (PEPP) vs. Duffy (CSUF)/Ramstedt (LBSU), 1:30 p.m. Campana (PEPP) vs. Tcherkes-Zade (LMU)/Pachl (UCSD), 1:30 p.m. #83 Redelijk (PEPP) vs. Leung (UCSD)/Deaifi (GCU), 3 p.m. #23 Broadus (PEPP) vs. Masuda (HAWAII)/Meraz (UCI), 3 p.m.

FOLLOW: Follow @WavesTennis on Facebook and X for immediate updates, results and more. Go to pepperdinewaves.com for all information, releases and schedules.

MALIBU, Calif. -- A driver has been arrested after a car struck four women who were standing along the side of Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu, California, authorities said. Several parked vehicles were also hit.

The crash was reported around 8:30 p.m. Tuesday.

A male driver lost control of his vehicle and crashed twice into parked cars, according to the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department. When the driver hit the second set of parked vehicles, he fatally struck four female victims who were standing on the side of the road, authorities said.

Two other victims were rushed to a hospital in unknown condition.

The male driver was initially detained. A sobriety test was administered, and authorities said Tuesday night that drugs and alcohol did not seem to be a factor.

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On Wednesday morning, a sheriff's spokesperson said the driver was arrested. The suspect was not publicly identified, nor were the possible charges against him announced.

At least four vehicles were believed to be involved in the collisions.

Bodies were visible at the scene, along with severely damaged vehicles. The Los Angeles County Fire Department told ABC Los Angeles affiliate KABC that speed was likely a factor in the crash.

"As soon as it happened I knew exactly what it was -- car accident. It's happened here a lot," Malibu resident Barron Miller told reporters at the scene.

Authorities are investigating whether two drivers may have been street racing at the time of the collision. Residents in the area say it has become a growing problem along that stretch of PCH.

"Since COVID there has been an increase of incredible racing up and down this highway, all night long," Joan Zoloth of Malibu said. "People in the community have complained and are really concerned. And then you have something like this."

Part of Pacific Coast Highway remained closed Wednesday morning, with no estimate of when lanes would be reopened.

"This one's tough. There's just a lot of carnage, just metal carnage," L.A. County Fire Capt. Sheila Kelliher Berkoh said. "Anytime you come and there's four bodies that didn't survive, that's a tough one to watch."