Committee looks at diversity course
April 15, 2008
Students enrolling at MU in fall 2009 will have a new requirement added to their graduation checklist: a course in topics concerning diversity.
“The final type of course that will be implemented is still in discussion,” said Jennifer Claxton, Missouri Students Association Multicultural Issues Committee chairwoman. “There’s a big possibility that courses counting as diversity intensive will relate to students’ majors, as with cross-cultural journalism for journalism majors.”
In a January MSA Senate report, former Multicultural Issues Committee chairwoman Melissa Vought stated that MSA, Four Front and the Legion of Black Collegians would work together to write legislation concerning the course. The committee also held a town hall meeting so students could voice their opinion on whether there was a need for a diversity course and, if so, what the objectives of the course should be and how it should be implemented.
After discussions among these groups, Claxton met with Vice Provost for Undergraduate Studies Jim Spain and discussed possibilities for the course.
“We talked about where we saw it going and also where Four Front has suggested it should go,” Claxton said. “Jim’s all on board and very supportive and wants it implemented by fall of 2009.”
Claxton said interim Chief Diversity Officer Roger Worthington will head a committee to discuss the diversity course and work out details before making a final recommendation to Spain.
“The committee will consist of faculty members and will be an advisory panel concerning how to best approach incorporating a diversity requirement into the general education structure,” Worthington said.
Worthington said the committee is designed to think through the complex issues of integrating a course requirement within an institution with 10 different academic colleges and schools in addition to graduate programs and other academic units, each with individual needs and requirements.
The panel will discuss the positive and negative factors associated with different methods of administering the requirement. It has not yet been decided whether the course will be a class solely targeting diversity-related issues or whether certain courses more directed to individual majors will fulfill the requirement. Claxton said the goal is to have each college contain a course that at least touches on diversity throughout life or directly in the workplace, whether it be diversity of race, gender, sexuality or experience.
Worthington said after the committee defines specific goals and necessities for the diversity course, their proposal will go through the Committee on Undergraduate Education and hopefully earn approval.
Worthington said preparing a proposal will take a lot of discussion and investigation of different methods of implementation.
“There has been a proposal to have some sort of diversity requirement many, many times over the past 15 to 20 years,” Worthington said. “Each time, though, it hasn’t fit in right and the idea has just been dropped.”
Worthington said right now he and the committee are working through the process of finding a viable option to include the course that will also address the problems that have resulted from dropping the issue in the past.
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