General Education at St. Edward’s University: A Mission-Centered Liberal Arts Curriculum - presented by Cory Lock, Director of General Education, St. Edward's University

1. General Education at St. Edward’s
University:
A Mission-Centered Liberal Arts Curriculum

2. Why You Need to Know This
Because…
• Teaching gen ed courses? Need to know how
they relate to rest of gen ed curriculum
• Advising? Need to guide your students and
support what they are learning
• No matter what you teach, need to know how
your course fits with the overall curriculum and
mission

3. The value of an education in a liberal arts college is not
the learning of many facts but the training of the mind
to think something that cannot be learned from
textbooks.
Albert Einstein
A caring faculty and staff…encourage individuals to
confront the critical issues of society and to seek
justice and peace. Students are helped to understand
themselves, clarify their personal values and recognize
their responsibility to the world community.
 St. Edward’s University
Mission

4. St. Edward’s University:
A Liberal Arts Community
• Aim: develop the whole person
• Students learn to think critically and creatively
and how to apply these skills to problem solving.
• An emphasis on moral reasoning and social
justice enriches our general education
curriculum.

7. Foundations for Values and
Decisions
• Freshman Studies Lecture (Introduction to the Liberal
Arts)
• Ethics
• Religious Studies/Philosophy
• Science in Perspective
• Science in Depth

8. Foundational Skills
• Rhetoric and Composition I and II
• College Mathematics
• Oral Communication
• Computational Skills
• Foreign Language (2 semesters)

9. Cultural Foundations
• CULF 1318: Literature and Human Experience
• CULF 1319: Understanding and Appreciating the
Arts
• CULF 1320: The American Experience
• CULF 2321: American Dilemmas
• CULF 3330: History and Evolution of Global
Processes
• CULF 3331: Contemporary World Issues

10. St. Edward’s Mission and University
Learning Outcomes (UELOs)
Inform….
CAPS
4360:
Capstone
Foundations
for Values and
Decisions
Foundational
Skills
Cultural
Foundations

11. History of Gen Ed at SEU: How
We Got Here
• Origins in 1974 with early versions of Freshman
Studies and Capstone
• In the early 1990s, major general education
revision, moving from a cafeteria plan to a core
curriculum
• Various initiatives have invigorated the core
curriculum throughout its 20-year existence

12. Current General Education
Renewal
• Beginning a 4-year, faculty-led review and
revision
• Anticipate a phased introduction of new
curriculum beginning in Fall 2018
– This means 4+ more years of the current curriculum
• New curriculum may be different, but it will still
be liberal arts curriculum guided by SEU mission
principles and University Essential Learning
Outcomes (UELOS)

13. Questions about General Education at SEU?
• Cory Lock, Director of General Education:
julial@stedwards.edu
• University Essential Learning Outcomes:
https://sites.stedwards.edu/seugened/essential-learning-
outcomes/
• General Education:
http://think.stedwards.edu/universitystudies/generaleducation
• Common Threads in the General Education Curriculum:
http://think.stedwards.edu/education/common-threads
• General Education Renewal:
http://sites.stedwards.edu/seugened/