UC 101 - University Colloquium - Sustainable Communities
this page last updated on 5 September 1999

SYLLABUS CONTRACT
The University Colloquium: Citizenship and Sustainable Communities
Preparing Citizens for the 21st Century

Course Description - Objectives & Structure - Readings - E-mail - Evaluation & Assessment - Extra Credit - Class Policies

In addition to this Syllabus, you should read the Schedule, Assignments and Contacts Links above for a full understanding of nature and expectations of this class.

COURSE DESCRIPTION

UC 101 - University Colloquium (Fall, 1999)
Topic: Citizenship and Sustainable Communities
3 credit hours; Tu-Th 2:20-3:35

Instructors & Course Meeting Locations:
Dr. Abe Springer (Geology), Bldg. 12/Geology - Room 103 - Seq. no. 66250
Dr. Marcus Ford (Humanities, Arts & Religion), Bldg. 26/Adel Mathematics - Room 224 - Seq. no. 66253
Dr. Alan A. Lew (Geography & Public Planning), Bldg. 26/Adel Mathematics - Room 146 - Seq. no. 66228
Dr. Carolyne White (Educational Leadership), Bldg. 26/Adel Mathematics - Room 206 - Seq. no. 66229

Course Prerequisite: Students must have freshman standing as of Fall semester, 1999.

Course Description:
This is a required liberal studies course for all freshmen at Northern Arizona University.

Many students enter the university curious about what it means to be a student, about what will expected of them, and unsure how to negotiate the demands and expectations of a university curriculum. This course is designed to provide students with a seminar type class in which they work with faculty to arrive at clearer understandings of the university and of their roles as students.

This course will introduce students to the intellectual challenges that characterize the university community through common readings and experiences. It will also help them become more cognizant of their own strengths and of the areas in which they need more work, and to understand the role of a strong liberal education for all students regardless of their major. The aim of the course is to help students succeed by helping them to understand and identify the kinds of skills, abilities and competencies they will need to develop as students. The colloquium will describe the challenges and standards inherent in our intellectual and academic work at the university level. In doing this, the course will help students develop a stake in their own education, set their own goals, and to gain a clearer picture of how the university can help them reach those goals.

As the first required course of the NAU Liberal Studies Program, the University Colloquium will teach the following essential skills: effective writing, critical reading, and critical thinking. In addition, this course will cover the following Liberal Studies Themes: Environmental Consciousness and Technology and it's Impact.

In this section of University Colloquium we will explore the issues of sustainability and sustainable communities. This will include the role of students as citizens of sustainable communities. The course will focus on Flagstaff as a case study of the sustainable and non-sustainable elements of communities.

Click on "Other" above to see the FYE (First Year Experience) Information Sheet

COURSE OBJECTIVES & STRUCTURE

General Course Goals:

1. Students will demonstrate an understanding of liberal education.
2. Students will describe the value of liberal education in relation to their intellectual and personal development.
3. Students will demonstrate an awareness of citizenship in the communities in which they learn, live, and work.

Objectives for Skills
Effective Writing

1. Students will demonstrate a familiarity with the writing process and campus resources to improve their writing.
2. Students will express in writing how their experience in the colloquium will enable them to be active, responsible participants in this educational community and in the other communities in which they live and work.
3. Students will display a strong awareness of audience and show evidence in their writing of careful, thoughtful revision.

Critical Thinking

1. Students will identify both valid and invalid connections between apparently disparate concepts.
2. Students will use evidence to support conclusions.
3. Students will identify premises/presuppositions for arguments.
4. Students will demonstrate reflective problem solving skills.

Critical Reading

1. a. Students will identify and interpret structure, setting, content, source/purpose, and appropriate reading methods when reading class material.
2. b. Students will identify both valid and invalid connections between apparently disparate concepts through the readings.
   

Objectives for Themes
Students will be able to:
1. Describe the impact of technology and the role of cultures in creating the communities we live in today.
2. Describe the major cultural, technological and environmental issues and challenges that lead to sustainable communities.

Interdisciplinary Objective
Students will be able to define their role as citizens in creating and maintaining sustainable communities.

Course Structure
This course is team planned and team taught between four instructors. Each instructor will provide a perspective of sustainability from their individual academic and cultural background/training. Each instructor will contribute two weeks of the course that relates their academic discipline to the issue of sustainability and communities

Prelude (weeks 1-4)
The prelude stands as a general introduction to the notion of academic community and to citizenship by raising explicit issues regarding this larger theme and by delineating the standards and challenges students will need to work toward. Concomitantly, the prelude will present students with a model of how academic communities function in relation to commonly addressed questions, ideas and problems.

Interdisciplinary Exploration (weeks 5-13)
Whereas the prelude is meant to provide a general introduction to the underlying theme of the colloquium and the liberal studies program as a whole, and to the standards that characterize the university community at NAU, the interdisciplinary exploration provides opportunities for instructors and students alike to focus more specifically on the ways in which various disciplines contribute to our understanding of a range of problems and topics. This course is designed to help students understand the importance of a liberal education, an education that enables them to, as William Cronon argues, make connections: "More than anything else, being an educated person means being able to see connections that allow one to make sense of the world and act within it in creative ways."

Coda (weeks 14-15)
In the final weeks of this course, in the coda, students will take what they have learned so far and begin to relate this learning to their own goals, to their strengths, and to the areas in which they need more work. As part of the coda, all students will complete a self-reflective essay that will become part of their learning portfolio. We want students to leave the course with a clearer sense of how the university and its parts (liberal studies, the major, the minor, electives, co-curricular activities, etc.) can help them work successfully to achieve at their highest level. Put another way, we want students to leave the colloquium understanding what it means to be a student and with the notion that their time at NAU will make significant contributions to their development.

TEXTBOOK AND READINGS

Course Packets:

1. University Colloquium Course Packet (NAU Bookstore) - This is a common packet of readings that all UC101 sections will cover
2. Sustainable Communities Course Packet (NAU Bookstore) - This is a packet of readings for all students enrolled in the Sustainable Communities Colloquium Sections
   

Books:

1. The Bean Trees : A Novel, by Barbara Kingsolver, New York: HarperPerennial, 1992. (Summer reading program text; NAU Bookstore)
   
2. The Rediscovery of North America, by Barry Lopez, New York: Vintage Books, 1992. (NAU Bookstore)

Click on Assignments to see the specific readings require from each of these course packets.

E-MAIL REQUIREMENT

All students in the Sustainable Communities sections of UC101 must have an e-mail address. The e-mail address must be provided to your instructor by the end of the first week of classes. Students are expected to check their e-mail for instructor messages about every 3 days.

In addition, because many of the readings for UC101-Sustainable Communities are on the WWW, students are required to become familiar with computer resources available at NAU and use these to access their e-mail and web-based material for this class.

Computer Assistance available at NAU can be found on the Contacts Link (at the top of this page), or you can go there now, by clicking here.

EVALUATION & ASSESSMENT

Evaluation methods:
The following common assignments will be evaluated in every section of the University Colloquium:
1. Initial essay on The Bean Trees
2. Essay based on interdisciplinary content
3. Final reflective essay on citizenship or personal development

Evaluation and grading in the interdisciplinary section may be based on exams (which will include both essay and objective questions), written assignments, and/or any additional methods deemed appropriate by the instructor (oral presentations, projects, etc.). 80% of expectations will be common for each team.

Assessment of Outcomes:

All students in the University Colloquium will develop learning portfolios through which they will demonstrate their ability to meet the outcomes outlined in the Course Objectives part of this syllabus. Individual faculty teams may also determine specific ways that students will meet outcomes specific to their sections of the course.

The Learning Portfolio
All students in the University Colloquium will begin to compile a learning portfolio that will stand as a record of their work and development in this course. This portfolio will form the basis for the learning portfolio which students will keep throughout their undergraduate careers at NAU. The portfolios completed as part of the University Colloquium will include:

§ Initial essay on The Bean Trees - (Prelude Assignment)
§ Essay connecting interdisciplinary content (Prelude and Coda Assignment)
§ Final reflective essay on citizenship or personal development - (Coda Assignment)

Assignments

Grading system

90%, 900 points and above =A
80%, 800 points and above = B
70%, 700 points and above = C
60%, 600 points and above = D
below 60%, 600 points = F

Your Prologue/Coda Instructor will be primarily responsible for recording and maintaining your grades throughout this semester. (This is the instructor that you had for the first four weeks of the class and for the last several weeks.)

EXTRA CREDIT

You can earn extra credit in this class by attending up to five outside events or activities that are related to the class and writing a one page (typed, double spaced) report on the event. Each report is worth up to 10 points and the most that you can earn this way is 50 points. See your prologue/code instructor for additional instructions for the extra credit paper.

Approved event are listed on the Schedule page. The list of events will be added to as they are announced. You can also suggest that other event be included by contacting any of the instructors for this class.

All Students will be Required to attend one of the open sessions of the Sustaining Rural Environments conference on October 21 and 22. and to write and extra-credit paper on the session that they attended.

CLASS POLICIES

Retests/makeup tests
Retests and makeup tests will be given at the discretion of the instructor and these policies need to be spelled out here.

Attendance
You are responsible for regularly attending this course and all courses for which you are registered. Should an absence from class be unavoidable, you are responsible for reporting the reason to your instructor. In addition, you are responsible for making up any work or information you missed. Your instructors are under no obligation to make special arrangements for you if you are absent. Make-up work will be allowed at the instructor's discretion for "pop" quizzes, response essays or other unannounced assignments you missed on the day(s) of your absence. As a result, absences can lower your final grade.

Plagiarism and Cheating
If you are caught Plagiarizing (using work done by someone else without fully citing its source) or Cheating, you may be removed from this course or given a grade for "F" for the class.

True Stories from the Bent Newswire: UNCLEAR ON THE CONCEPT AWARD -- A Penn Sate University woman decided to offer a fellow student $1,200 in stereo equipment to take an exam for her. The student agreed, but failed the exam. When he refused to return the stereo, the woman got furious and went to the police, claiming she had been cheated. The police sympathized then charged her with purchasing academic work, which is also illegal. -- wonder if it was an ethics course...

NAU Policy Statements

NAU Classroom Civility Statement