ERIC Number: EJ1382797
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2023
Pages: 13
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0307-5079
EISSN: EISSN-1470-174X
Available Date: N/A
Questions Instead of Majors: Implementing a Self-Authored Concentration Program
Studies in Higher Education, v48 n4 p582-594 2023
The major is a standard undergraduate degree structure in which learners follow largely predetermined course paths with the primary goal of developing content knowledge and skills. Developing the more sophisticated ability to author inquiry is typically deferred to graduate training but can, we believe, be successfully cultivated in undergraduates through a self-authored concentration. This approach flips the conventional order of higher education by establishing self-authorship as the primary goal, from which knowledge and skill acquisition follow, and by placing primary responsibility on students--guided by faculty mentors--to design their course of study. As an extreme form of interdisciplinary inquiry-based learning and of self-designed majors, the self-authored concentration poses a deliberately disorienting dilemma in service of a deliberately developmental degree, preparing graduates for the rapidly changing demands of the future. We describe the implementation, features of success, and trade-offs of one such program, the single degree offering at Quest University Canada.
Descriptors: Undergraduate Students, Majors (Students), Individualized Instruction, Undergraduate Study, Inquiry, Active Learning, Curriculum Design, Foreign Countries, Interdisciplinary Approach, Guided Pathways, Independent Study
Routledge. Available from: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 530 Walnut Street Suite 850, Philadelphia, PA 19106. Tel: 800-354-1420; Tel: 215-625-8900; Fax: 215-207-0050; Web site: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Descriptive
Education Level: Higher Education; Postsecondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Canada
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Author Affiliations: N/A