Themes

• Analyze concepts of citizenship, justice and diversity at a more advanced and in-depth level than in the Foundations component.
• Integrate approaches to understanding citizenship for a just and diverse world by making connections to out-of-classroom experiences with academic knowledge or across disciplines and/or to work they have done in previous classes and that they anticipate doing in future.
• Explore and analyze a range of perspectives on local, national or global citizenship and apply the knowledge, skills and dispositions that constitute citizenship.
• Examine notions of justice amid difference and analyze and critique how these interact with historically and socially constructed ideas of citizenship and membership within society, both within the United States and around the world.

Successful students will be able to:

• Engage in critical and logical thinking about the topic or idea of citizenship for a just and diverse world.
• Undertake an advanced, in-depth, scholarly exploration of the topic or idea of citizenship for a just and diverse world.
• Identify, describe and synthesize approaches or experiences as they apply to citizenship for a just and diverse world.
• Demonstrate a developing sense of self as a learner through reflection, self-assessment and creative work, building on prior experiences to respond to new and challenging contexts.
• Describe and analyze a range of perspectives on what constitutes citizenship and how it differs across political, cultural, national, global and/or historical communities.
• Identify, reflect on and apply the knowledge, skills and dispositions required for intercultural competence as a global citizen.
• Examine, critique and evaluate various expressions and implications of diversity, equity and inclusion, and explore a variety of lived experiences.
• Analyze and critique the intersection of concepts of justice, difference, citizenship, and how these interact with cultural traditions, structures of power and/or advocacy for social change.

Intended to enable students to explore issues related to humans and their lived environments through both objective and subjective lenses inclusive of physical, biological, cultural and aesthetic space that individuals and groups occupy, and the relationship between humans and these environments.

• Inspect Lived Environments at a more advanced and in-depth level than in the Foundations component.
• Integrate approaches to understanding lived environments by making connections to out-of-classroom experiences with academic knowledge or across disciplines and/or to work they have done in previous classes and that they anticipate doing in future.
• Explore a range of perspectives on the interactions and impacts between humans and one or more types of environment (e.g., agricultural, built, cultural, economic, intellectual, natural) in which humans live.
• Analyze a variety of perceptions, representations and/or discourses about environments and humans within them.

Successful students will be able to:

• Engage in critical and logical thinking about the topic or idea of lived environments.
• Conduct an advanced, in-depth, scholarly exploration of the topic or idea of lived environments.
• Identify, describe, and synthesize approaches or experiences as they apply to lived environments.
• Demonstrate a developing sense of self as a learner through reflection, self-assessment and creative work, building on prior experiences to respond to new and challenging contexts.
• Engage with the complexity and uncertainty of human-environment interactions.
• Describe examples of human interaction with and impact on environmental change and transformation over time and across space.
• Inspect how humans' interactions with their environments shape or have shaped attitudes, beliefs, values and behaviors.
• Detail how humans perceive and represent the environments with which they interact.
• Analyze and critique conventions, theories and ideologies that influence discourses around environments.

Following the recommendations of The Ohio State Sustainability Education and Learning Committee, courses within the Sustainability Theme consider the fundamental dependence of humans on earth and environmental systems. These courses focus on the interdependence of human and natural systems through the lenses of what have been termed the dimensions of sustainability, which include environmental and earth systems; economy and governance; society and culture; engineering, technology and design; and health and well-being.

• Investigate sustainability at a more advanced and in-depth level than in the Foundations component.
• Integrate approaches to sustainability by making connections to out-of- classroom experiences with academic knowledge or across disciplines and/or to work they have done in previous classes and that they anticipate doing in future.
• Analyze and explain how social and natural systems function, interact and evolve over time; how human well-being depends on these interactions; how actions have impacts on subsequent generations and societies globally; and how human values, behaviors and institutions impact multifaceted potential solutions across time.

Successful students will be able to:

• Engage in critical and logical thinking about the topic or idea of sustainability.
• Conduct an advanced, in-depth, scholarly exploration of the topic or idea of sustainability.
• Identify, describe and synthesize approaches or experiences as they apply to sustainability.
• Demonstrate a developing sense of self as a learner through reflection, self-assessment and creative work, building on prior experiences to respond to new and challenging contexts.
• Articulate elements of the fundamental dependence of humans on Earth and environmental systems, and on the resilience of these systems.
• Describe, analyze and critique the roles and impacts of human activity and technology on both human society and the natural world, in the past, present and future.
• Devise informed and meaningful responses to problems and arguments in the area of sustainability based on the interpretation of appropriate evidence and an explicit statement of values.

References nine dimensions of wellness, a model developed in 2014 after an extensive focus group process, conducted by the Ohio State Center for the Study of Student Life. The Wellness Collaborative, a group of Ohio State students, faculty and staff, took the lead on crafting the dimensions and defining them based on feedback received from various stakeholder groups. Other elements of human health and well-being may certainly be included in courses that address this theme.

• Analyze health and well-being at a more advanced and deeper level than in the Foundations component.
• Integrate approaches to health and well-being by making connections to out-of-classroom experiences with academic knowledge or across disciplines and/or to work they have done in previous classes and that they anticipate doing in future.
• Explore and analyze health and well-being through attention to at least two dimensions of well-being. (e.g., physical, mental, emotional, career, environmental, spiritual, intellectual, creative, financial, etc.)

Successful students will be able to:

• Engage in critical and logical thinking about the topic or idea of health and well-being.
• Conduct an advanced, in-depth, scholarly exploration of the topic or idea of health and well-being.
• Identify, describe and synthesize approaches or experiences as they apply to health and well-being.
• Demonstrate a developing sense of self as a learner through reflection, self-assessment and creative work, building on prior experiences to respond to new and challenging contexts.
• Explore and analyze health and well-being from theoretical, socio-economic, scientific, historical, cultural, technological, policy and/or personal perspectives.
• Identify, reflect on or apply strategies for promoting health and well-being.

Addresses the underlying structural causes of mobility and immobility; the socio-political, economic, environmental and cultural phenomena contributing to and resulting from migration, forced displacement, incarceration, disability or flight; people's hopes and fears about staying or going; and the forms of artistic expression that explore these conditions.

• Analyze Migration, Mobility, and Immobility at a more advanced and in-depth level than in the Foundations component.
• Integrate approaches to understanding the issues involved in migration, mobility, and immobility by making connections to out-of-classroom experiences with academic knowledge or across disciplines and/or to work they have done in previous classes and that they anticipate doing in future.
• Explore and analyze a range of perspectives on migration, mobility, and immobility, including causes and effects, personal or group experiences, or artistic expression.
• Explain a variety of scholarly or artistic approaches to understanding mobility and immobility, and analyze how texts, perceptions, representations, discourses, or artifacts represent these concerns.

Successful students will be able to:

• Engage in critical and logical thinking about migration, mobility and immobility.
• Conduct an advanced, in-depth, scholarly exploration of migration, mobility and immobility.
• Identify, describe, and synthesize approaches or experiences as they apply to migration, mobility, and immobility.
• Demonstrate a developing sense of self as a learner through reflection, self-assessment and creative work, building on prior experiences to respond to new and challenging contexts.
• Explain environmental, political, economic, social, or cultural causes of migration, mobility, and/or immobility.
• Describe and analyze diverse experiences or portrayals of migration, mobility, or immobility (e.g. migration, incarceration, disability, or flight) and the complex effects of these phenomena on individuals, societies, institutions, and/or places.
• Discuss how migration, mobility, or immobility have shaped attitudes, beliefs, behaviors, and values of individuals and/or institutions.
• Describe how people (e.g. scholars, artists, scientists, etc.) perceive or represent migration, mobility, or immobility and critique conventions, theories, and/or ideologies that influence such perceptions or representations.

Mathematics seems to be, simultaneously, a construct of the human mind, an extraordinarily powerful tool for understanding nature, and an abstract realm that exists independently of both humans and natural phenomena. Courses in this theme address foundational issues in mathematics, applications of mathematics in the natural sciences, and aspects of cognitive psychology and artificial intelligence that apply to mathematical comprehension and logical reasoning. Students examine the differences and interactions between "pure" mathematics that seeks logical proof and mathematics as applied to science and the description of nature. Students grapple with the still unresolved philosophical questions of whether and how logical reasoning leads to incontrovertible truths, of why mathematics is so "unreasonably effective" in the natural sciences, and of how and why humans are able to understand and use mathematics.

• Analyze the ideas embodied within Number, Nature and Mind at a more advanced and in-depth level than in the Foundations component.
• Integrate approaches to understanding the ideas embodied within Number, Nature and Mind by making connections to out-of-classroom experiences with academic knowledge or across disciplines and/or to work they have done in previous classes and that they anticipate doing in future.
• Experience and examine mathematics as an abstract formal system accessible to mental manipulation and/or mathematics as a tool for describing and understanding the natural world.

Successful students will be able to:

• Engage in critical and logical thinking about the ideas embodied within Number, Nature and Mind.
• Conduct an advanced, in-depth, scholarly exploration of the ideas embodied by Number, Nature and Mind.
• Identify, describe, and synthesize approaches or experiences as they apply to Number, Nature and Mind.
• Demonstrate a developing sense of self as a learner through reflection, self-assessment and creative work, building on prior experiences to respond to new and challenging contexts.
• Analyze and describe how mathematics functions as an idealized system that enables logical proof and/or as a tool for describing and understanding the natural world.

Having an appreciation of the deep past is important for understanding humanity's place in the universe. The Origins and Evolution theme puts humans into this larger context and allows us to recognize the fragility of the human condition, how and why humans have survived over time (i.e., our strength as a species) as well as how and why other closely related human species became extinct.

• Analyze Origins & Evolution at a more advanced and in-depth level than in the Foundations component.
• Integrate approaches to understanding the issues involved in origins and evolution by making connections to out-of-classroom experiences with academic knowledge or across disciplines and/or to work they have done in previous classes and that they anticipate doing in the future.
• Appreciate the time depth of the origins and evolution of natural systems, life, humanity, or human culture, and the factors that have shaped them over time.
• Understand the origins and evolution of natural systems, life, humanity, or human culture, and the factors that have shaped them over time.

Successful students will be able to:

• Engage in critical and logical thinking about the topic or idea of origins and evolution.
• Conduct an advanced, in-depth, scholarly exploration of the topic or idea of origins and evolution.
• Identify, describe, and synthesize approaches or experiences as they apply to origins and evolution.
• Demonstrate a developing sense of self as a learner through reflection, self-assessment and creative work, building on prior experiences to respond to new and challenging contexts.
• Illustrate their knowledge of the time depth of the universe, physical systems, life on earth, humanity or human culture by providing examples or models.
• Explain scientific methods used to reconstruct the history of the universe, physical systems, life on earth, humanity or human culture and specify their domains of validity.
• Engage with current controversies and problems related to origins and evolution questions.
• Describe their knowledge of how the universe, physical systems, life on Earth, humanity or human culture have evolved over time.
• Summarize current theories of the origins and evolution of the universe, physical systems, life on earth, humanity or human culture.

Explores the study of cultures and societies, past and present, from single and multidisciplinary approaches. To understand the contemporary world, one must understand its past, individual cultures and societies, the creation and development of sub-cultures, as well as the impact of ideological, technological and environmental innovations and changes. Tradition and culture are not static; ideas, institutions, environments (ecological, geological, cosmological), and technologies foster change or promote continuity.

• Analyze Traditions, Cultures, and Transformations at a more advanced and in-depth level than in the Foundations component.
• Integrate approaches to understanding traditions, cultures, and transformations by making connections to out-of-classroom experiences with academic knowledge or across disciplines and/or to work they have done in previous classes and that they anticipate doing in future.
• Engage in a systematic assessment of how cultures and sub-cultures develop and interact, historically or in contemporary society.
• Engage in a systematic assessment of differences among societies, institutions, and individuals' experience within traditions and cultures.

Successful students will be able to:

• Engage in critical and logical thinking about the topic of traditions, cultures, and transformations.
• Conduct an advanced, in-depth, scholarly exploration of the topic traditions, cultures, and transformations.
• Identify, describe, and synthesize approaches or experiences as they apply to traditions, cultures, and transformations.
• Demonstrate a developing sense of self as a learner through reflection, self-assessment and creative work, building on prior experiences to respond to new and challenging contexts.
• Describe the influence of an aspect of culture (religious belief, gender roles, institutional organization, technology, epistemology, philosophy, scientific discovery, etc.) on at least one historical or contemporary issue.
• Analyze the impact of a big idea or technological advancement in creating a major and long-lasting change in a specific culture.
• Examine the interactions among dominant and sub-cultures.
• Explore changes and continuities over time within a culture or society.
• Recognize and explain differences, similarities, and disparities among institutions, organizations, cultures, societies, and/or individuals.
• Articulate ways in which categories such as race, ethnicity, and gender and perceptions of difference, impact individual outcomes and broader societal issues.

Service-learning can be defined as a course in which students participate in defined, supported service activities that benefit the community, and in which they reflect on their experience to enhance their understanding of course topic and discipline.

Courses identified as GE Integrative Practice (Service-Learning) should include:

• Performance expectations set at appropriately high levels (e.g., students engage in appropriately linked academic and experiential exploration of the community setting in which they study).
• Significant investment of time and effort by students over an extended period of time (e.g., students develop an increasing appreciation of the issues, resources, assets, and cultures of the community in which they are working).
• Interactions with faculty, peers and community partners about substantive matters including regular, meaningful faculty mentoring, peer support and community partner interaction.
• Frequent, timely and constructive feedback to students on their work from all appropriate sources, especially on their community awareness and engagement, and their experience with difficult differences.
• Periodic, structured opportunities to reflect and integrate learning (e.g., students reflect on the service activity in such a way as to gain further understanding of course content, a broader appreciation of the discipline, and an enhanced sense of personal values and civic responsibility).
• Opportunities to discover relevance of learning through real-world applications (e.g., students identify intentional connection between academic content and the community work in which they engage).
• Public demonstration of competence in academic settings and, if possible, in the community engagement site.
• Experiences with diversity wherein students demonstrate intercultural competence and empathy with people and worldview frameworks that may differ from their own.
• Explicit and intentional efforts to promote inclusivity and a sense of belonging and safety for students (e.g., use of universal design principles, culturally responsible pedagogy).
• Clear plan to market this course to get a wider enrollment of typically underserved populations.

Both Global and Intercultural Learning courses and programs help students explore cultures, life experiences and worldviews different from their own. These courses, which may address U.S. diversity, world cultures, or both, often explore difficult differences such as racial, ethnic and gender inequality, or continuing struggles around the globe for human rights, freedom, environmental justice, power, and other issues relevant to General Education themes. Frequently, intercultural learning is augmented by immersion experiences in diverse communities in local and global settings.

Courses identified as GE Integrative Practice (Global and Intercultural Learning) should include:

• Performance expectations set at appropriately high levels, engaging in both academic and experiential exploration of the setting in which they study.
• Significant investment of effort by students over an extended period (e.g., program length meets high academic standards and allows students to build meaningful connections with local community members and to develop a deep understanding of local cultural context).
• Interactions with faculty and peers about substantive matters including cultural self-awareness, intercultural empathy and academic content.
• Students will get frequent, timely and constructive feedback on their work, from all appropriate sources, on their intercultural interactions and academic learning.
• Periodic, structured opportunities to reflect and integrate learning, especially on their cultural self-awareness and their experience with difficult differences.
• Opportunities to discover relevance of learning through real-world applications and the integration of course content to contemporary global issues and contexts.
• Public demonstration of competence both in academic settings and, if possible, in the study away site.
• Experiences with diversity wherein students demonstrate intercultural competence and empathy with people and worldview frameworks that may differ from their own.
• Explicit and intentional efforts to promote inclusivity and a sense of belonging and safety for students (e.g., use of universal design principles, culturally responsive pedagogy, structured development of cultural self-awareness).
• Clear plans to promote this course to a diverse student body and increase enrollment of typically underserved populations of students.

Undergraduate research is defined by the Council on Undergraduate Research as an inquiry or investigation conducted by an undergraduate student that makes an original intellectual or creative contribution to the discipline. Undergraduate creative inquiry is the parallel to research, engaging in a rigorous creative process using (inter)disciplinary methods.

Courses identified as GE Integrative Practice (Research and Creative Inquiry) should include:

• Performance expectations set at appropriately high levels (e.g., students investigate their own questions or develop their own creative projects).
• Significant investment of time and effort by students over an extended period (e.g., scaffolded scientific or creative processes building across the term, including, as examples, reviewing literature, developing methods, collecting data, interpreting or developing a concept or idea into a full-fledged production or artistic work).
• Interactions with faculty and peers about substantive matters including regular, meaningful faculty mentoring and peer support.
• Frequent, timely and constructive feedback for students on their work (iteratively scaffolding research or creative skills in curriculum to build over time).
• Periodic, structured opportunities to reflect and integrate learning in which students interpret findings or reflect on creative work.
• Opportunities to discover relevance of learning through real-world applications (e.g., mechanism for allowing students to see their focused research question or creative project as part of a larger conceptual framework).
• Public demonstration of competence, such as a significant public communication of research or display of creative work, or a community scholarship celebration.
• Experiences with diversity wherein students demonstrate intercultural competence and empathy with people and worldview frameworks that may differ from their own.
• Explicit and intentional efforts to promote inclusivity and a sense of belonging and safety for students (e.g., use of universal design principles, culturally responsible pedagogy).
• Clear plan to market this course to get a wider enrollment of typically underserved populations.

Integrative, interdisciplinary, team-taught courses must address a topic that is too broad or complex to be dealt with adequately by a single discipline or profession, draw on different disciplinary perspectives, and integrate their insights through construction of a more comprehensive perspective.

Courses identified as GE Integrative Practice (Integrative, Interdisciplinary, Team-Taught Courses) should include:

• Performance expectations set at appropriately high levels (e.g., students investigate large, complex problems from multiple disciplinary perspectives).
• Significant investment of time and effort by students over an extended period (e.g., engage the issue iteratively, analyzing with various lenses and seeking to construct an integrative synthesis).
• Interactions with faculty and peers about substantive matters including regular, meaningful faculty mentoring and peer support about conducting interdisciplinary inquiry.
• Frequent, timely and constructive feedback for students on their work (scaffolding multiple disciplinary perspectives and integrative synthesis to build over time).
• Periodic, structured opportunities to reflect and integrate learning (e.g., students should work to integrate their insights and construct a more comprehensive perspective on the issue).
• Opportunities to discover relevance of learning through real-world applications and the integration of course content to contemporary global issues and contexts.
• Public demonstration of competence, such as a significant public communication of their integrative analysis of the issue.
• Experiences with diversity wherein students demonstrate intercultural competence and empathy with people and worldview frameworks that may differ from their own.
• Explicit and intentional efforts to promote inclusivity and a sense of belonging and safety for students (e.g., use of universal design principles, culturally responsive pedagogy, structured development of cultural self-awareness).
• Clear plans to promote this course to a diverse student body and increase enrollment of typically underserved populations of students.

Courses that include learning in a language other than English offer experiences that are culturally different from what students usually experience at Ohio State. These courses are driven by learning goals that create integrative, high-impact learning. They help students explore theme content across languages, cultures, life experiences and worldviews. Intercultural learning is augmented by virtual and/or in-person target language experiences in diverse linguistic communities and settings.

Courses identified as GE Integrative Practice (Instruction in a Language Other Than English) should include:

• Critical thinking and analysis: Students will systematically and methodically analyze their own and others' assumptions in light of linguistic and cultural contexts and carefully evaluate the impact of these perspectives when representing a position.
• Intercultural communication: Students will use the target language appropriately in the interpersonal and presentational modes to develop and present a position on the theme.
• Scholarly engagement: Students will engage with the theme content in the target language through written, spoken and visual modes.
• Intercultural communication: Students will articulate appropriately a thorough and complex understanding of the issues, resources and assets of the theme as discussed in the target language and as embedded in the target culture(s).
• Integration of knowledge and adaptability: Students will connect, analyze and adapt knowledge (facts, theories, etc.) about theme content in the context of the target language and culture(s).
• Multiple perspectives: Students will evaluate and apply diverse perspectives from multiple cultural lenses and from more than one language to complex subjects.
• Collaboration: Students will engage in collaborative approaches to the theme with classmates and/or interlocutors outside the classroom community.
• Self-awareness: Students will thoroughly evaluate the impacts on themselves and their understanding of the discipline(s) that they have gained by studying the theme in the target language and from the perspective of the target culture(s).
• Intercultural Competence: Students will identify and demonstrate perspectives related to the theme that reflect an interculturally competent global citizen (such as respect, openness, curiosity, adaptability and empathy).