Conceiving University Studies

Abstract

These next 2 articles trace the founding of University Studies from 2 distinct points of view-that of a historian who was a member of the 1st cohort of faculty to teach in Freshman Inquiry and that of the current director of the program, who chaired the original committee charged with revising the general education program. The first article chronicles the significant individuals and the unique set of events that brought the program to fruition; the second provides an insider’s account o f the deliberations and decisions of those who actually devised the reform.

In 1993, as the General Education Working Group was struggling to understand the core issues involved in constructing a meaningful general education experience for the students at Portland State University, we suddenly realized that we were talking about learning outcomes rather than a set of requirements. This shift marked a significant turning point in the development of what was to become University Studies. Without that shift in focus, our reform of general education would not have been possible. This commitment to the learning and success of our students serves as the “touchstone” of University Studies and is the thread that runs through each of the contributions to this special issue. Observations of other reform efforts, along with our own, makes clear that this is the essential component in any serious effort to improve undergraduate education. The appropriateness of a learner-centered pedagogy and curriculum is now widely acknowledged by the academic community, not only in rhetoric, but increasingly in action. But this was not always the case.

The History We Carried

Historically, general education at Portland State University, as at so many institutions around the country, was a set of requirements intended to expose students to a range of disciplines and to develop a set of specific skills in writing and math. The traditional formula required a complex set of courses from different disciplinary areas. Changes to general education, when they occurred, were most often renegotiations of the required mix of credits; seldom was there any focus on or understanding of the specific learning outcomes to be achieved.

In the early 1980s, a faculty task force at Portland State spent several years investigating, proposing, and negotiating revisions in the then-existing general education distribution requirements. The arguments put forth were based not on any knowledge about how curriculum and pedagogy correlated with learning, but only upon assertions of the variety and amount of subject matter to which students should be exposed. As is often the case in discussions of distribution requirements, changes in student credit hours—the primary currency in higher education—was the driving force in renegotiating agreements among departments. The result at Portland State University, as at so many other universities, was usually a slight alteration in credit hours or courses and not much else. There was no meaningful change in the student experience. And there certainly was no discussion of student-centered classroom practices.

From Requirements to Learning: Proximate Causes

This was the context within which the General Education Working Group began its review of general education at Portland State University in 1993. Our shift from thinking of a modified list of distribution requirements to the articulation of explicit learning goals occurred as a result of two proximate causes.

The first was the meeting of the Association of American Colleges (now the Association of American Colleges and Universities) in January 1993, which the entire working group attended. Few members of the group were aware of the existence of scholarship on student learning, curriculum design, or the educational experience. Attending conferences focused on higher education itself, rather than on disciplinary specializations, had not been faculty practice. That collective experience provided the introduction to the relevant body of research and the emotional impetus that subsequently sustained the argument for a shift from requirements to outcomes. In addition, there was a renewed interest in the interactive effects between learning outcomes and the larger student experience. Our review of general education moved from a discussion about how to repackage the distribution requirements to a scholarly, research-based effort that focused on a better understanding of student learning, curriculum design, and effective pedagogies.

The second impetus came from the provost, Michael Reardon. He posed this simple but fundamental question to the working group: “Can you state with conviction that the current general education requirements are meaningful?” It did not take long for us to conclude that our answer was a resounding “No.” At the same time, we realized that an acceptable alternative would have to frame a meaningful set of goals and articulate a curriculum intentionally designed to achieve those goals.

From Requirements to Learning: The Importance of Research

A complete review of the research on which University Studies was ultimately based is available elsewhere (White, 1994). However, some of the key influences that shaped both the vision and the structure of the reform are worth summarizing here. The first is the research on our students. Portland State is an urban university with a student profile consistent with that described by Peggy Gordon Elliott (1994) in her study of urban institutions:

• • A high percentage of first generation students.

• • Students with a broad range of prior academic experiences and preparation.

• • A high percentage of returning and older students.

• • A high proportion of students who began their college work at another institution.

• • A majority of students who commute from off-campus and have no on-campus “place.”

• • A majority of students who work half-time or more, most of whom work off-campus.

• • A large number of students who attend part-time and who take more than 6 years to graduate.

The consequences of these characteristics for student learning have been dramatically argued in the research of Alexander Astin (1992). He summarized his key findings by identifying factors that were associated with positive and negative effects on general educational outcomes.

The factors that have a negative influence on successful learning are perhaps too familiar to those who have taught, supported, or advised urban students:

• • Living at home; commuting.

• • Full time employment; off-campus employment.

• • Large institutional size.

• • Frequent use of teaching assistants.

• • Lack of community among students.

• • Watching television.

The list of factors found to have positive associations with general educational success lends strong support to the importance of affiliation and connection for learning:

• • Student-student interaction.

• • Student-faculty interaction.

• • A student-oriented faculty.

• • Tutoring other students.

• • An institutional emphasis on diversity.

• • Discussing racial and ethnic issues with other students.

• • Hours devoted to studying.

Astin’s research turned out to be particularly influential in the design of University Studies, especially for entering students. The Freshman Inquiry and Transfer/Transition courses both emphasize the building of a sense of student community and connection to the university. With fewer extracurricular and campus-wide social activities than a residential campus, the primary site for the achievement of these goals at an urban university is the classroom. This reality places increased importance, not only on the content of the general education curriculum, but also on its structure and delivery.

New Foundations

The content of that curriculum, the learning goals it was to embody, and the forms of delivery it should take were all derived from research on curricular design, student learning, student success, and the characteristics of Portland State’s student body. The foundation of the program is expressed in the statement of purpose—to facilitate the acquisition of knowledge, abilities, and attitudes which will form a foundation for lifelong learning—and the 4 major goals of critical thinking, communication, appreciating the human experience, and ethical issues and social responsibility. These continue to provide direction for the development of the curriculum and the assessment of the program. ¹

The curriculum that was built on this foundation is connected across all 4 years of the undergraduate experience, includes student support and community-building as intentional activities, and provides an interlocking set of different interdisciplinary opportunities for collaborative learning. Every course included in the curriculum is required to demonstrate how the 4 goals are addressed, with the expectation that students will encounter them with increasing sophistication and a growing ability to integrate them with knowledge from their major field as they progress through their 4 undergraduate years of study.

The Direction We Now Travel

Figure 1.

Curriculum Linkages in University Studies

The following figure provides a visual image of the way we see this series of courses fulfilling the design in terms of the interplay between the fundamental goals of University Studies and the curricular content of the courses designed to incorporate those goals. The achievement of this twin set of outcomes should be known to the students as practical and meaningful answers to the questions “What can I do?” and “What do I know?” As students move through the 4-year curriculum, the emphasis on these distinct but related outcomes shifts from the more process-oriented to the more substantive, while at the same time increasing in both the depth and the complexity with which they are explored. Clearly this is an ideal, but it is an ideal well worth striving for. It is certainly an ideal that we have not fully realized, but, as the variety of voices in this special issue attest, it has served to generate a great deal of thought and innovation, as well as challenge and frustration—and even moments of elation and despair. It continues to call us forward in our continuing efforts.