Tag: Courses

  • Courses Studying Trump Proliferate, Risking President’s Ire

    Courses Studying Trump Proliferate, Risking President’s Ire

    Donald Trump’s second term in office continues to confound onlookers. Yet a growing number of universities around the world are offering courses for students to try to make sense of the mercurial president.

    The University of Pennsylvania has launched Climate and Environment Journalism: Truth-Telling in the Trump Era through its English department and American Conservatism From Taft to Trump for political science students. The New School’s Donald Trump as History module will aim to explore the “Trump phenomenon” and how it alters views of U.S. history, while the University of Washington offers a special Trump in the World module.

    Universities outside the U.S. are also involved. First run in 2017, Trumpism: An American Biography is an optional module for second-year history students at the University of Sheffield, which explores how U.S. history can shed light on the present.

    Andrew Heath, lecturer in U.S. history at Sheffield, told Times Higher Education that part of the module’s purpose was to get students thinking about the history of terms such as populism that are “often thrown around in the media to make sense of Trump and Trumpism,” and to encourage them to think critically about the way that comparisons are invoked.

    But teaching about such a fast-moving political situation is not easy. “It’s a module that always poses challenges—readings can quickly feel dated; teaching it in an election year last time around was harder. Every iteration of the unit needs significant updating,” added Heath.

    Christopher Breem, managing director of the McCourtney Institute for Democracy at Pennsylvania State University, said it is always hard to teach about something going on in the present. But this is often what students are most interested in because they recognize that it is important to them and their future to understand it, he said.

    “I think if you are up front with students that there are unavoidable risks associated with teaching any subject in real time, they accept that.”

    Breem, who taught a course on Trump’s unorthodox campaign in 2016, said there are positive sides to it as well, allowing lecturers the opportunity to talk about populism in U.S. history, and about similar populist movements throughout the world.

    “If you use Trump as an opportunity to talk about where we are and how we got here, you can end up with a really good class.”

    The University of East Anglia is offering an optional module on MAGA: Donald Trump and Twenty-First Century America, University College Dublin has a Trump’s America option, and the University of Southern Denmark has one on U.S. society under Trump.

    During the first Trump presidency, some academics came under an intense national spotlight for their courses that explicitly referenced him. One professor who previously taught a course mentioning Trump said the whole experience was “unpleasant,” with staff and the university receiving numerous phone calls and emails.

    “The university took my information off the website, and we had a police officer outside of the classroom,” the professor said. “I turned on my house alarm during the day. Frightened, I turned down opportunities for press interviews.”

    The academic, who wished to remain anonymous, said it was hard to keep up with the constant change and disruption of the Trump administration but that students were very engaged.

    And they said academics have a professional and ethical responsibility to talk about Trump’s policies in classes, if it is related to course content, but should “tread carefully on how public you make it.”

    However, Richard Lazarus, professor of law at Harvard University and course director for a module on environmental law under Trump, said he had “zero” worries about drawing the ire of the administration.

    “We are not advocates who use our classes to tell students what action they should take. We are teachers and scholars who inform our students, give them the skills to think in a rigorous, disciplined way, and with integrity. They then decide how to use their skills.”

    Other new courses for this year include the People’s Guide to Trumpism at the University of San Francisco and Trump vs. Science at Hampshire College.

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  • Texas A&M Requires Approval for Courses That “Advocate” Certain Ideologies

    Texas A&M Requires Approval for Courses That “Advocate” Certain Ideologies

    Courses that “advocate race or gender ideology, sexual orientation, or gender identity” now require presidential approval at Texas A&M system campuses, the system Board of Regents decided Thursday.

    Faculty members and external advocacy groups say the new rules violate academic freedom, and for many professors, questions remain about how the policies will be implemented and enforced. Approved in a unanimous vote after a lengthy public comment period, the policy changes fit a pattern of censorship at Texas A&M that escalated after a video of a student challenging an instructor about a lesson on gender identity went viral, leading to the instructor’s firing and the resignation of then-president Mark Welsh.

    Dan Braaten, an associate professor of political science at Texas A&M San Antonio and president of the campus American Association of University Professors chapter, said he was shocked “at the egregiousness” of the policies, but not surprised by them.

    “Faculty are extremely worried,” Braaten said. “They’re wondering, can they teach the classes they’re scheduled to teach in the spring? Who’s going to be looking at their syllabi? … Is the president of each A&M university going to have to approve every syllabus? Are there penalties for any of this? It’s just a complete … serious violation of academic freedom.”

    The board approved the new rules as revisions to existing system policies. A policy on “Civil Rights Protections and Compliance” will be amended to state that “no system academic course will advocate race or gender ideology, sexual orientation, or gender identity unless the course is approved by the member CEO.” It will also define “gender ideology” as “a concept of self-assessed gender identity replacing, and disconnected from, the biological category of sex.”

    Similarly, “race ideology” is defined as “a concept that attempts to shame a particular race or ethnicity, accuse them of being oppressors in a racial hierarchy or conspiracy, ascribe to them less value as contributors to society and public discourse because of their race or ethnicity, or assign them intrinsic guilt based on the actions of their presumed ancestors or relatives in other areas of the world. This also includes course content that promotes activism on issues related to race or ethnicity, rather than academic instruction.”

    Teaching Versus Advocacy

    A previous version of the revision proposed that no system academic course will “teach” race or gender ideology, but the verb was changed to “advocate” before the policies were presented formally to the full board. It’s unclear how the system will differentiate between advocacy and regular instruction on these topics. Representatives for the board on Wednesday declined to comment on the policies ahead of the board vote. They did not respond to Inside Higher Ed’s questions after the policies were approved.

    A second policy on “Academic Freedom, Responsibility and Tenure” previously stated that “each faculty member is entitled to full freedom in the classroom in discussing the subject that the faculty member teaches, but a faculty member should not introduce a controversial matter that has no relation to the classroom subject.” The approved amendment adds that faculty members may not “teach material that is inconsistent with the approved syllabus for the course.”

    In a partially redacted Nov. 10 email obtained by Inside Higher Ed, a Texas A&M faculty leader said that administrators at several universities were already discussing implementation plans ahead of the board vote. An administrator also told the faculty leader that the changes to the policy would not likely lead to a formal syllabus-approval process and instead are intended to keep course content aligned with learning outcomes.

    The board received 142 written comments ahead of Thursday’s vote, and eight faculty members spoke out against the policy changes during the meeting’s public comment period. Several of them also called for Melissa McCoul, the professor fired in September, to be reinstated.

    “This is not university-level education, it is cruelty and political indoctrination in wolf’s clothing,” said Leonard Bright, a professor of government and public service and president of the Texas A&M College Station AAUP chapter. “I would need to tell my students that ‘What you came here to learn, I’m unable to tell you, because I’m restricted to tell you that information, even though such knowledge is available at every major university in this world.’”

    Sonia Hernandez, a liberal arts professor who teaches about Latin American history, shared a past example that highlighted the pitfalls of the new policies.

    “I had a student once who took issue with my discussion of the importance of military history. He was against war and felt strongly about war’s damaging effects on society, yet it was full academic freedom—not cherry-picking of topics, not advocacy, not ideology—that allowed me to share research on the intersections of war and identity with my class,” Hernandez said.

    Two faculty members—finance professor Adam Kolasinski and biomedical engineering professor John Criscione—spoke in favor of the policy changes.

    “I don’t think somebody should be able to say that Germans born two generations after the Holocaust somehow bear guilt for the Holocaust, because that’s really what’s being prohibited here,” Kolasinski said. “My colleagues seem to think that the policy says something it doesn’t.” Kolasinski also suggested the board change the language back from “advocate” to “teach.”

    AAUP president Todd Wolfson urged the board to reject the proposed policy changes in a statement Tuesday. So did Brian Evans, president of the Texas Conference of the AAUP, which includes faculty at Texas A&M campuses.

    “By considering these policy changes, the Texas A&M University System Board of Regents is telling faculty, ‘Shut up and teach—and we’ll tell you what to teach,’” Evans said in the statement. “This language and the censorship it imposes will cause irreparable harm to the reputation of the university, and impede faculty and students from their main mission on campus: to teach, learn, think critically, and create and share new knowledge.”

    In a Monday statement, FIRE officials wrote, “Hiring professors with PhDs is meaningless if administrators are the ones deciding what gets taught … Faculty would need permission to teach students about not just modern controversies, but also civil rights, the Civil War, or even ancient Greek comedies. This is not just bad policy. It invites unlawful censorship, chills academic freedom, and undermines the core purpose of a university. Faculty will start asking not ‘Is this accurate?’ but ‘Will this get me in trouble?’ That’s not education, it’s risk management.”

    AI-Driven Course Review

    Also on Thursday, the board discussed a detailed, systemwide review of all courses using an artificial intelligence–driven process. The system has already piloted the review process at its Tarleton State University campus, where most of the courses that were flagged are housed in the College of Education, which includes the sociology and psychology departments, the Nov. 10 email from a faculty leader stated. Board members said they intend to complete the course review regularly, as often as once per semester.

    “The Texas A&M system is stepping up first, setting the model that others will follow,” Regent Sam Torn said about the course review at Thursday’s meeting.

    The system will also use EthicsPoint, an online system that will allow students to report inaccurate, misleading or inappropriate course content that diverges from the course descriptions. System staff will be alerted when a student submits an EthicsPoint complaint, and if the complaint is determined to be valid, it will be passed along to the relevant university.

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  • Summer Courses to Help Incoming College Students Adjust

    Summer Courses to Help Incoming College Students Adjust

    National data suggests today’s college students are less prepared to succeed in college than previous cohorts, due in part to the COVID-19 pandemic and remote instruction. Students lack academic and socio-emotional readiness, administrators say, prompting colleges to implement new interventions to get them up to speed.

    For years, Mount Saint Mary’s University in California has offered a summer bridge program for students who may be less prepared to make the transition to college, such as first-generation students.

    This summer, MSMU launched Summer Pathways, which is designed for all incoming students to get a head start on college. They complete two college courses for free and are able to connect with peers and explore campus before starting the term.

    “We felt the earlier we can engage students, the better,” said Amanda Romero, interim assistant provost.

    How it works: Summer Pathways is a six-week, credit-bearing experience that takes place in the middle of the summer, after orientation in June but before classes start in August.

    During the program, students complete a Summer Pathway seminar and one additional introductory course, choosing among sociology, English and mathematics.

    Students take classes Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays; on Tuesdays and Thursdays they participate in workshops about managing their time, dealing with impostor syndrome or maintaining well-being.

    “We’ve invited the whole campus community to come in, meet with our students in person, talk about their careers, their offices, how they ended up at the Mount, what their hopes and aspirations are for the future,” said Elizabeth Sturgeon, interim assistant provost and director for Summer Pathways.

    The goal is to make students aware of campus resources and connect them with faculty and staff early in their college careers.

    The program also takes students on fun excursions around Los Angeles, including to the ballet, the Hollywood Bowl and the Getty Museum.

    The experience is free, and students are given a $250 stipend to help pay for gas and food. They can also pay $3,000 to live in a residence hall for the six-week program if they don’t want to commute to campus each day.

    A community approach: While many faculty work on eight-month contracts and have the summers off, Sturgeon and Romero said it wasn’t difficult to get professors engaged and on campus for the program.

    “We had departments that had never participated in Summer Pathways before, never knew what it was about, opting in and coming down in person to present to our students,” Sturgeon said.

    “It’s important for our core faculty to get in front of students, and this is a great opportunity to do just that,” Romero said.

    Returning students also stepped up to serve as peer mentors for new students.

    The program has paid off thus far, leaders said, with students hitting the ground running at the start of the term.

    “It offers a smoother transition,” Romero said. “A lot of anxiety with starting a new place is ‘where’s this, where’s that, where do I go?’”

    “They know what the resources are, they know where to park, what to order in the cafeteria,” Sturgeon said. “They have a friend group; they have that one peer mentor who’s their friend they can reach out to. From day one, in the business of being a college student, they’re an alum after six weeks.”

    What’s next: In summer 2025, 66 out of 90 incoming students participated in Summer Pathways, engaging in five different courses. And 98.5 percent of them matriculated in the fall.

    In the future, campus leaders hope to introduce project-based learning into the courses, interweaving the university’s mission as a Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet institution.

    “We just want to make it bigger going forward, with more classes and students participating,” Sturgeon said.

    The overarching dream is to get all incoming students to sign up, but administrators recognize that those who don’t live in the region may face additional barriers to engaging in in-person activities because they lack housing. Sturgeon and Romero are pushing for additional resources to offer housing and seeking solutions to address the need for additional funding and staffing.

    If your student success program has a unique feature or twist, we’d like to know about it. Click here to submit.

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  • Shutting Women Out of Preferred Courses Sets Them Back

    Shutting Women Out of Preferred Courses Sets Them Back

    Getting shut out of a preferred course can have lasting negative effects on incoming female students, a recent working paper found.

    The paper, published by the National Bureau of Economic Research, tracked first-year students at Purdue University who couldn’t take their first-choice classes in 2018 because of a surge in enrollment. Incoming students had to rank their course preferences; 49 percent got into all the courses they wanted, but 51 percent were shut out of a course.

    The study found that female students locked out of a course were 7.5 percent less likely to graduate within four years than women who got to take their desired courses. Their cumulative college GPAs were also slightly lower—by 0.05 points—than those of female students who took their preferred classes their first semester. Women locked out of a course were 5 percent less likely to major in STEM fields and even earned about 3.5 percent less in salary after they graduated, compared to female students who took their top-choice courses their first year.

    The working paper found no statistically significant effects on male students.

    “Our estimates suggest that reducing course shutouts, particularly for STEM courses, can be an effective way to improve female-student outcomes,” co-author Kevin Mumford, an associate dean and professor at Purdue’s Mitch Daniels School of Business, told The Wall Street Journal.

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  • Dual Enrollment and AP Courses Yield Positive Outcomes

    Dual Enrollment and AP Courses Yield Positive Outcomes

    A recent report from the Community College Research Center at Columbia University’s Teachers College found that high school students graduate college at higher rates and earn more after college if they’ve taken a combination of dual-enrollment and Advanced Placement courses.

    The report, released Tuesday, drew on administrative data from Texas on students expected to graduate high school in 2015–16 and 2016–17, as well as some data from students expected to complete in 2019–20 and 2022–23. It explored how different kinds of accelerated coursework, and different combinations of such work, affected student outcomes.

    Researchers found that students who combined Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate courses with dual-enrollment courses boasted higher completion rates and earnings than their peers. Of these students, 92 percent enrolled in or completed a credential a year after high school, and 71 percent earned a credential by year six.

    These students also showed the strongest earnings outcomes in their early 20s. They earned $10,306 per quarter on average at age 24, compared to $9,746 per quarter among students who took only dual enrollment and $8,934 per quarter for students who took only AP/IB courses. However, students taking both dual-enrollment and AP/IB courses tended to be less racially and socioeconomically diverse than students taking AP/IB courses alone, the report found.

    Students who combined dual enrollment with career and technical education—who made up just 5 percent of students in the study—also reaped positive outcomes later in life. These students earned $9,746 per quarter on average by age 24, compared to $8,097 per quarter on average for students with only a CTE focus.

    “Most dual-enrollment students in Texas also take other accelerated courses, and those who do tend to have stronger college and earnings trajectories,” CCRC senior research associate Tatiana Velasco said in a press release. “It’s a pattern we hadn’t fully appreciated before, which offers clues for how to expand the benefits of dual enrollment to more students.”

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  • Unis need modern tech for flexible courses – Campus Review

    Unis need modern tech for flexible courses – Campus Review

    Calls for universities to offer shorter, more flexible courses that meet the demands of Australia’s future economy must be met with better technology management, according to sector voices from a leading software company.

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  • UTS defends decision to cut courses – Campus Review

    UTS defends decision to cut courses – Campus Review

    The University of Technology Sydney (UTS) has given evidence to a federal senate inquiry that probed how cutting education and public health courses aligns with its public mission.

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  • Smarter Support: How to Use AI in Online Courses and Teach Your Students to Use It Too – Faculty Focus

    Smarter Support: How to Use AI in Online Courses and Teach Your Students to Use It Too – Faculty Focus

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  • Smarter Support: How to Use AI in Online Courses and Teach Your Students to Use It Too – Faculty Focus

    Smarter Support: How to Use AI in Online Courses and Teach Your Students to Use It Too – Faculty Focus

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  • UTS cuts 400 jobs, suspends 140 courses – Campus Review

    UTS cuts 400 jobs, suspends 140 courses – Campus Review

    The University of Technology Sydney (UTS) has “temporarily suspended” new enrolments to more than 100 bachelor and postgraduate programs, with 400 staff jobs under threat.

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