Achieving Institutional Reform: The Full Integration of Science into the General Education Curriculum

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With support from NSF, we will initiate and implement an institution-wide reform that will infuse mathematics and science into the heart of our liberal arts education. Previous support from NSF allowed us to develop a truly innovative integrated math and science program for non-science majors that has enriched both our students and faculty. Our evaluation of this work has made it clear that more must be done: that scientific ideas must be valued throughout the academic community if our students are to find them relevant and important. The profound impact that science has had on culture, and that our cultures have had on science and technological development, is not often given central attention in college curricula. Yet it is imperative that our students, who will shape the social and political fabric of the 21st Century, understand both scientific initiatives and their social and political consequences. Having built a science and math program that gives students "direct experience with the methods and processes of inquiry," as recommended by a recent NSF study group, the faculty at Drury are poised to take up the challenge of integrating into our core courses the methodology and ideas that give understanding to the complex connections between the sciences and humanities. Drury College is uniquely equipped to undertake this task. Over the last four years, faculty have designed and implemented a new interdisciplinary general education curriculum. Building upon this momentum, we now seek to make it truly integrated by conducting seminars for faculty development and construction of materials for our general education core courses. The success of this project will fully empower our faculty and graduates to confront the social and scientific challenges of the 21 st Century, and we believe it will serve as a model for other institutions as they strive to educate students who are scientifically literate.