Focus Group on Topical Approaches to General Education: Questions to Consider

The fourth focus group of our series, centered on Topical Approaches to general education, will be this Tuesday, 25 February, at 4:15 pm in the Laurel Forum. The GERTF and Design Team would like to invite all interested faculty and staff members to attend this session (and the others), which will be facilitated by a GERTF member.

At this forum, we will participate in a conversation about some of the models for topical approaches to general education programming and delivery. We will discuss the issues faculty indicated were most important to them when they raised the possibility of this curricular element during the Listening Project and our fall Faculty Forum on general education. We anticipate using these discussions to assist us as we think about writing charges for the specific curricular requirements. The Design Team has reached some preliminary conclusions about the structure and content of a revised curriculum, but would like the benefit of your input on the following questions:

1. In the Listening Project, faculty indicated an interest in topical approaches to the delivery of general education. What are your desired outcomes for students taking courses arranged this way? What are your desired outcomes for faculty teaching their courses this way?

2. What knowledge, skills, and awareness do you want to give students the opportunity to develop in such a requirement?

3. What interconnections to the liberal arts curriculum would you like this approach to facilitate? How do you think these interconnections might best be structured?

4. What criteria do you think are most important as identifying features of courses taught in this arrangement?

5. What issues or concerns do you have regarding the oversight of such an approach?

We are eager to have the benefit of your input, ideas, and expertise as we move toward a model for the revised general education curriculum.