Instructing Information

The course syllabus for all disciplinary Foundations courses should include the following three Core Learning Outcomes:

Responsible and Ethical Communicators

Marquette students can responsibly and ethically use written, spoken, and visual communication to express ideas, create meaning, build relationships, foster understanding, and advocate for a better tomorrow;

Moral and Ethical Actors

Marquette students can articulate appropriate professional and personal judgments that are rooted in an ethical and moral foundation that is informed by Catholic, Jesuit thought. They seek to use these foundations to make decisions that promote stronger communities and a just society; and

Citizens with Purpose

Marquette students will come away with a sense of purpose, personally and professionally, as global citizens who demonstrate critically reflective discernment processes that are rooted in one’s sense of theological, intellectual, and personal commitments.

The following guidelines are designed to help you situate the Methods of Inquiry course in the broader MCC on your syllabus. This will also create consistency for the students about how the MOI is a key component of the Core and their Marquette education. An MOI course syllabus should:

• State directly that this course is fulfilling a primary goal of the Marquette Curriculum, namely, the importance of introducing students to the importance of considering the big issues facing us today from multiple perspectives. Explain in a paragraph what issue the course addresses and what disciplinary perspectives and methods it will employ.
• The course may have other learning outcomes, but it should also include the language of three Core Learning Outcomes:

  Responsible & Ethical Communicators. Marquette students can responsibly and ethically use written, spoken and visual communication to express ideas, create meaning, build relationships, foster understanding, and advocate for a better tomorrow; 

  Moral and Ethical Actors. Marquette students can articulate appropriate professional and personal judgments that are rooted in an ethical and moral foundation and informed by Catholic, Jesuit thought. They seek to analyze the sources and implications of inequity for a stronger community and a just society; and  

  Leaders in Discovery. Marquette students will advance the understanding of the world by identifying significant questions and then searching for answers based on a systematic process of discovery that is rooted in intellectual inquiry and the Jesuit liberal arts tradition. 

The following guidelines are designed to help you discuss the ESSV requirement on your syllabus. This will also create consistency for the students about how the ESSV is a key component of the Core and their Marquette education. An ESSV course syllabus should:

• State directly that this course is fulfilling a primary requirement of the Marquette Curriculum and how it will do so. Explain in a paragraph how the course is directly and substantially addressing the aims of the ESSV component of the MCC.
• The course may have other learning outcomes, but it should also include the following Core Learning Outcome:

  Collaborators Promoting Equity and Justice across Cultural Contexts

  Marquette students will develop skills to understand how power, positionality, and privilege shape their own lives and those of others, locally and globally. They will be able to describe how racism, colonialism, classism, sexism, other forms of prejudice, and other oppressive forces have impacted and continue to impact the well-being of marginalized groups and to identify historical and structural barriers to equity and inclusiveness. They will also be able to recognize the innate human dignity shared across diverse groups and to apply skills learned in class to work within and across cultures to promote justice and equity.

• Identify and describe the assignment(s) and activities associated with the ESSV outcome. These should include written assignments, discussions, and, when possible, experiential learning activities. Remember: one of the most important goals of the ESSV component is to help students to engage with diverse others and provide opportunities to practice and communicate their abilities, and those opportunities should be integrated into course assignments and activities (graded and ungraded). 

In order to help our students identify meaningful connections across their Discovery Tier classes and integrate different disciplinary approaches to their selected theme, the syllabus for each Discovery Tier course should clearly explain the substantive connections between the course topic and the Discovery Theme. This creates a more consistent student experience and aids in the required curricular assessment process.

Consequently, the syllabus for every Discovery Tier course should have each of the following three elements:

• a prominently placed paragraph identifying the course as a Discovery Tier course and linking the course topic to the relevant Discovery Theme and at least one of the corresponding Guiding Questions;
• at least one course-specific learning objective that indicates student learning expectations related to the Discovery theme. The learning objective makes this connection to the theme explicit;
• a brief description of the assignments (e.g., readings, activities, papers, exam questions, etc.) that ask students to make substantive connections between the course topic and the Discovery Theme.

The course syllabus for all disciplinary Foundations courses should include all six of the Core Learning Outcomes:

Responsible and Ethical Communicators, Moral and Ethical Actors, Citizens with Purpose, Collaborators Promoting Equity and Justice across Cultural Contexts, and Leaders in Discovery, with a special focus on

Global Problem Solvers

Marquette students are well-practiced in cooperative and cross-disciplinary problem-solving skills and can present innovative solutions that draw from theological, philosophical, qualitative and quantitative perspectives to address the increasingly blurred lines between local and global challenges.