How will this be appealing to admissions?
It is a special program/certificate making the core curriculum more robust (it would actually bring us more in line with aspirant institutions). The courses will generate open resources that will also be marketable.
How can we get advisors within major degree programs on board to work with students who want to complete the connected core?
We won’t get them all. We should invest energy in making sure students who pursue this program get assigned to advisors who are allies
What is the incentive for students?
You’re going to have fun in these courses and you’ll earn a certificate that will appear on your transcript and prompt employers to ask you about core courses.
What makes these courses connected?
Faculty teaching in the program collaborate to create a sequenced experience of the core. Students who complete a particular course will have read a specific common text and completed a similar assignment–these texts and assignments will be referenced and returned to in future courses.
We started this program focused specifically on the humanities and humanistic social sciences. Should it stay that way?
Expanding it out could increase the interdisciplinary payoff, but the program was designed to build community among humanities faculty and to increase the visibility of the humanities on campus. If we can expand without losing that, excellent.
How should we make decisions about core categories?
Trying to maximize the likelihood that students don’t already have required courses for the categories we build in? We want to make sure that the categories we build for function as true choices for as many students as possible. This is going to take some conversations with advisors in many different degree programs. SOON.
How will faculty know that students have experienced particular texts in previous courses?
They won’t know for sure because students in their courses won’t all be completing the connected core (at least not at first). Part of what we’ll develop together are strategies for referencing texts that some students will have studied before without alienating students who haven’t had that prior experience (open editions of these texts, annotated by students, will help with this–see the blog post announcing Transforming Humanities Texts).
How will things be sequenced?
Students will be encouraged (but not required) to take these courses in a particular sequence. This will be challenging, but doing so will allow faculty in upper-level courses to return to ideas students will have encountered in earlier courses. This sort of ability to gesture to texts students have already encountered is something that is largely lost on students in core courses at present.
Not all students take first-year English and history courses. What to do with these students?
Perhaps develop connected-core courses for CC 5.1 (Critical Thinking and Problem Solving), CC 7.1 (Individual and Society), and CC 8.1 (Global and Intercultural Awarencess). These courses could provide first-year options for students who don’t take ENGL or HIST
If an honors student wants to participate, what changes for them?
Perhaps we work out an Honors assignments for the courses we build so honors students could take them for honors credit??
Where are details for the Core Curriculum?
Details are in the catalog!
How Can We Make This Program Welcoming to Transfer Students?
If students have completed core courses equivalent to our first-year sequence, perhaps we can still welcome them to pursue a certificate by completing 15 credits in the upper-level options? At Purdue, students were required to complete one semester of transformative texts
How is This Different from the Honors Program?
It is honestly very similar to the honors program (and many honors students will likely want to participate). The primary difference is that there are no admissions requirements. Any student interested can participate as long as we have space.
Why Would Students Complete a Certificate Instead of a Minor?
We are currently putting systems in place to help more students discover and pursue a variety of minors. Our hope is that the program encourages the pursuit of minors. Connected-core courses should also fit into minor degree programs. Might we imagine that students in majors from A&S are more likely to pursue minors and that students in other colleges are more likely to pursue this certificate? While we’re on the subject, how can we think about badges that these courses might build toward? It seems best to think of the connected core as a way to encourage minors or double-majors for the students with flexibility in their schedules…and to give a more robust core experience to students who can’t fit that.
How Can We Keep This Curriculum Active?
We don’t want to settle on our connected texts and then never change them. How can we keep things fresh for ourselves and our students? Can we build this into the design of the program? Could the list of connected texts be constantly under review with student input?
Physical Space for Teaching and Exhibiting Student Work
We want to build into the design of this program a way for students to create virtual work (OpenLab), but also encourage the making of physical things. We need to think about the ideal classroom spaces for these courses (how can we use the classrooms in the new building?) and the sort of connection we want to have to the Makerspace. Part of designing courses could include a description of the ideal space to teach the course.
How will ENGL 1112 and HIST 1000 change?
We might want to create new versions of the existing courses, adding two new outcomes:
- Students will be able to articulate how the texts assigned in the course are relevant to their lives or career plans
- Students will be able to articulate how the methods of inquiry taught in the course are relevant to their lives or career plans
We might also consider giving a common prefix to connected core courses–perhaps HUMN? This might interfere with students finding them when searching Banner, so perhaps there are other strategies?
How Can We Give Upperclassmen in This Program Opportunities?
They can be hired to support faculty doing digital projects perhaps? They could work on the editions project, which will begin with some of the connected texts that will be assigned across courses. This would be an incredible work study job, but the university might also make it possible to hire students who are not eligible for work study.
Could This Facilitate a University-Wide Common Read Initiative?
Perhaps. This could be used to scale up the honors program common read for all students entering the university, perhaps as marketing for this program? Maybe this would be better to launch a bit later after the basics are sorted out.
