Like many universities, WCSU has identified cultural understanding as an important core value. We have indicated this in two of our values statements:
- Dialogue. We value the conversations that explore diverse perspectives and encourage shared understanding.
- Respect. We value the right of all people to be treated with dignity and fairness and expect this in our policies, classrooms, and community.
We have also included Intercultural Competency in our general education requirements:
Intercultural competence is defined by the following general characteristics: (1) knowledge about cultures, including knowledge about issues that can arise when members of diverse cultures interact; (2) receptive attitudes to learning about and maintaining contact with diverse others; and (3) skills required to draw upon both knowledge and attitudes when learning about and/or interacting with others from diverse cultures.
These statements are great, but what are we doing about it? Do we foster understanding and dialogue enough to support these learning goals and values? In several of my earlier blogs I have asked questions about whether or not our curriculum is sufficiently diverse. Today, I’d like to focus on student input into this conversation.
Now, I’m guessing that most students have not spent much time thinking about our values statements. They arise more from the vision of faculty, staff, and administration, than from our students, and they serve as a guide for how we should conduct ourselves. All of our students should know that their general education curriculum requires a course in Intercultural Competency, but many of them may not think about looking at the entirety of their education through a cultural lens.
I think it is time we ask our students what they think about our curriculum, as it pertains to ongoing interactions with ideas from cultures other than their own. Here’s what I’d ask:
- How many of the classes required in your major include cultural perspectives that are different from your own? List all relevant courses.
- Did you know this from the course descriptions? Please paste the relevant passages here.
- Did you discover this in the syllabi? Please paste relevant passages here.
- Did any of the courses have an Intercultural Competency (IC) label? Please list those courses.
- If a course was an IC course, do you remember how the learning outcomes were addressed?
- Have you taken courses outside of your major that included cultural perspectives that are different from your own? List all you can remember.
- Did you know this from the course descriptions? Please paste the relevant passages here.
- Did you discover this in the syllabi? Please paste relevant passages here.
- Did any of the courses have an Intercultural Competency (IC) label? Please list those courses.
- If a course was an IC course, do you remember how the learning outcomes were addressed?
- Thinking about the classes you’ve taken so far, how many of them included opportunities to discuss cultural perspectives different from your own? List all you can think of.
- How were those discussions approached? Check all that apply.
- Debates
- Presentations
- Small group discussions
- Part of routine class discussion
- Other (please describe)
- If you were to look for a course that included discussions of cultures different from your own, how would you go about finding that course? Beyond the IC label, are there specific words that indicate a cultural perspective different from your own?
- Looking at all of your responses above, do you think there are sufficient opportunities to learn about cultures different from your own in the WCSU curriculum? Please explain your answer.
- Are there ways that WCSU could improve on the opportunities to learn about cultures different from your own?
This survey could form a baseline read on our success at living up to curricular goals and university values. It might help us create better titles and course descriptions. It might reveal that there are gaps in our offerings. It might also give us some insights into what students are perceiving even before the register for a course. The question of the impact of these experiences should come later. First, we have to understand what our students are seeing in the curriculum.
You may notice that I haven’t asked if students want to learn about cultural perspectives different from their own. Given the diversity on our campus, the diversity in the workplace that students will experience after graduation, and the questions of cultural perspectives that arise within the political landscape both locally and nationally, I’m willing to commit to the need for this kind of education. I’m just not sure we are achieving the levels of exposure and engagement with cultural perspectives that we are hoping for.
There is one more thing that I should consider asking about though. I haven’t included a question about the cultural group the respondent identifies with. I probably should at the very end. I don’t want it to shape the responses, but it may be very telling in terms of their perceptions of our curriculum. We have a wonderfully diverse student body at WCSU, and that question might be really important to the interpretation of the results. So, I’m thinking about it.
What I do know is that I must provide a definition of a “culture different from your own.” That will be a project in inclusiveness, but I’m ready to take it on.
It’s also important for instructors to consider how much of the focus of their classes comes from a dominant cultural point of view that occludes other perspectives.
I agree. And that reflection tends to lead to many aha moments once we start thinking that way. I have been educated by my students and as a student on this topic on a regular basis. I continue to learn these lessons in my current role, from students, staff, and faculty. I think the trick is to foster reflection rather than putting folks on the defensive. That’s a trick indeed.
I will add that I phrased the question to the students as “a culture other than your own.” As you know, for many students at WCSU that will mean something other than the dominant cultural point of view. Hence my thoughts about asking for cultural identities in the survey. Mapping the responses to those identities is likely to be very informative.