Webinar: Civic Prompts in the Major: Disciplinary Knowledge, Democratic Culture, and the Public Good

AAC&U is pleased to announce the latest in a series of webinars that highlight the work being done at colleges and universities to address challenges and identify best practices for enhancing the teaching and learning experience and demonstrating the value of liberal education for work, life, and global citizenship.

Most students have substantial exposure to civic knowledge, values, skills, and hands-on learning through general education, but the road to responsible democratic engagement too often disappears in a student’s specialized field of study. Three campus practitioners leading efforts to build strong civic learning pathways for departmental majors will describe what worked best to engage colleagues about disciplinary-driven questions of social responsibility. They will also share how they are creating more intentional designs focused on the public good in courses scaffolded across requirements for their majors.

Designed primarily for faculty, departmental chairs, and academic administrators, this webinar is part of AAC&U’s larger project on incorporating civic learning in the major—Civic Prompts.

Participants will gather:

• A variety of practical approaches for engaging departmental colleagues in how to make civic learning and social responsibility more visible and integrated across courses in the major;
• Strategies for identifying the most salient public purposes in their fields and civic issues most urgent to explore;
• Discipline-specific approaches to civic inquiry that yield language, modes of analysis, and pedagogies appropriate to their areas of specialization; and
• Ways to tap both internal institutional priorities and external bodies that can serve as catalysts for reassessments, resources, and actions.

There will be time for Q&A during the webinar, and we encourage participants to send questions in advance towebinars@aacu.org.