December 8, 2021
Core Curriculum Update IX
This fall, we completed some important steps in our path to Core Curriculum revision:
  • Provost Shields approved the twelve new Essential Learning Outcomes (ELOs).
  • The Faculty Senate Ad Hoc Core Curriculum Committee began reviewing proposals drafted over the summer.
  • We started updating the Core Curriculum Proposal Form to include ELOs for all newly proposed Core classes.

Moving forward, we are shifting our attention to the next group of classes we can update with new ELOs. We're also working on a dashboard that will show how classes are progressing through the approval process. If you are interested in adding new ELOs to a Core class you teach, please email Gregory.Robinson@nsc.edu.

Our goal is to add new ELOs to every Core class by the end of Summer 2023. This will require identifying the courses we want to keep and going through the formal review process for each one. It's a heavy lift, but when we are done, the Core Curriculum will be much better aligned with our mission and values.
Important Resources
!. Website for Core Curriculum Essential Learning Outcomes. This page lists each ELO, the committees who worked on them, definitions for each outcome, and our current rubrics. This is a good resource for proposing new classes to the Core and adding ELOs to existing Core classes. This page is linked from our Provost's page, which is also looking pretty good.

2. Chart of ELOs and proposed classes. This chart lists each proposed class and its new ELOs. Once the Faculty Senate Ad Hoc Core Curriculum Committee and the appropriate school committee approve, the ELOs are officially a component of the class.

3. Form for adding new ELOs to an existing Core Curriculum class. This is the form we used for all the summer projects.

4. Proposed revisions to our Core Curriculum Form (for a new class). The Faculty Senate Curriculum Committee is currently reviewing this document.

5. Classes I'm hoping to add this fall. This list contains classes from each category that should be relatively easy to update. We'll save the more challenging classes for the summer, which will allow more time for problem solving.
The 200+ Class Elephant in the Room
The Core Curriculum provides students with a shared educational experience. No matter what major they choose, they will all take 10-15 classes addressing the fundamental skills that increase their chances for success. However, if you count all the classes in our existing Core Curriculum, you'll get well over 100 courses, If you add all the courses in categories where any class with a specific prefix counts (e.g., "Any ART," "Any PHIL" ), the number of classes that can be used for the Core is easily over 200.

In short, the Core is too big.

Each year, we've added classes but rarely taken any out, and the sheer bulk of the Core makes it difficult to give students a shared experience. We also have a number of 300 and 400 level courses that satisfy Core Curriculum requirements. Therefore, one of the challenges moving forward will be determining how we can be intentional about the Core and reduce the number of available classes. As we add ELOs to existing classes and update the Core, we also need to consider what classes we do not want to update. Evaluating the Core in this fashion will allow us to shape the Core deliberately, updating what we want to keep and removing the courses that no longer fit our model.
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