Proactive Course Crafting: Goal Area 7, Equity 2030, and English 105

Thursday, January 5, 2023
2:30 PM - 3:20 PM
Zoom

Presenters: Nancy Drescher, Ph.D., and Kevin Dover, Ph.D., English

Proactively responding to the Minnesota State Equity 2030 initiative and the updated language of Goal Area 7 in the Minnesota Transfer Curriculum, the Department of English housed in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences formed an Action Assessment Group in association with Dr. Beth Beschorner, the Associate Director of Equity in the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning to charter a course which would fulfill the objectives of the aforementioned, as well as serving, potentially, as a General Education requirement for the University as a whole, with a further possibility that this course could serve as a template, if deemed a success.

The Action Assessment Group composed of Dr. Edward A. Avila, Dr. Kevin Dover, Dr. Nancy L. Drescher, Dr. Danielle A. Haque, Dr. Kelly A. Moreland, and Dr. Gwen Westerman met on a weekly basis over the entirety of a semester, moving through each part of the course creation process ending with a course mockup, tentatively labeled, English 105 with the subtitle: Race, Rhetoric, and Representation. The entire process was documented, and many products were created to reach the project’s fruition. This group was voluntary, and all contributions were appreciated and equal. Over the course of that semester, many conversations were had and there were some fundamental disagreements that needed to be worked through, but we were still able to craft a course.

This presentation will focus on the overall process of proactive course crafting in hopes that this may serve as inspiration for other interested departments to take up the mantle. We feel that this need is pressing because Minnesota State Equity 2030 is fast approaching and Goal Area 7 is to become a standard, mandated learning outcome. The cliché goes that the best time to start working toward something was yesterday, but the second-best time is now, but not everyone knows where to start or even how to start, and it is here (now) that we see our practices serving the greatest good.