SQ: Intercultural Resources

USP Signature Question: How do people understand and bridge cultural differences?

Intercultural knowledge and competence is the understanding of one's own culture as well as cultures beyond one's own; the recognition of the cultural values and history, language, traditions, arts, and social institutions of a group of people; the ability to negotiate and bridge cultural differences in ways that allow for broader perspectives to emerge; and the skill to investigate a wide range of world views, beliefs, practices, and values.

Common Requirements for Courses

For Quest I courses with the Signature Question related to Intercultural Knowledge and Competence, include the following elements in your syllabus:

1. The Signature Question: How do people understand and bridge cultural differences?
2. The definition of Intercultural Knowledge and Competence: Intercultural knowledge and competence is the understanding of one's own culture as well as cultures beyond one's own; the recognition of the cultural values and history, language, traditions, arts, and social institutions of a group of people; the ability to negotiate and bridge cultural differences in ways that allow for broader perspectives to emerge; and the skill to investigate a wide range of world views, beliefs, practices, and values. 
3. A course description that includes central concepts of the SQ which will be taught over the semester and an explanation of the importance of the SQ to an incoming student.
4.  A statement answering the question that many incoming students are asking: Why a Liberal Arts education, and why now?
5. A list of knowledge, skills, and attitudes that will be taught in the course that, at the least, include those central to the AAC&U VALUE rubric on Intercultural Knowledge and Competence.
6. An explanation of the first early assessment assignment and its importance to student learning and inclusion of the assignment’s due date on the schedule, even if it is an in-class assessment (needs to be assigned within the first 2 weeks of the course).
7. An introduction of the ePortfolio and an explanation of why an assignment on the SQ must be uploaded to it.
8.  An acknowledgment within the syllabus that the course will provide actual experiences of cultural differences for students and a forum for discussing those experiences (it is not necessary to know exactly what form these experiences will take at this time but the student should be made aware of the importance of them to his/her learning about the SQ).

UW Oshkosh Essential Learning Outcomes Addressed

Video

Articles and Readings

• Being Black at a Predominantly White Universitytrong> by David L. Wallace and Annissa Bell from the January 1999 issue of College English
• The First Year at LaGuardia Community College by Paul Arcario from the Spring 2009 issue of Diversity & Democracy: Civic Learning for Shared Futures (an AAC&U publication)
• Race-Conscious Student Engagement Practices and the Equitable Distribution of Enriching Educational Experiences by Shaun R. Harper from the Fall 2009 issue ofLiberal Education (an AAC&U publication)
• Making Excellence Inclusive: A Framework for Embedding Diversity and Inclusion into Colleges and Universities' Academic Excellence Mission by Alma R. Clayton-Pederson, Nancy O'Neil and Caryn McTighe Musil (n.d.)
• Assessing Intercultural Competence by Darla K. Deardorff from the Spring 2011 issue of New Directions for Institutional Research
• Keeping Close to Home: Class and Education from the 1999 book Talking Back: Thinking Feminist, Thinking Black
• An Address on Native American Culture from UW Oshkosh student and President of the Inter-Tribal Student Organization, Kris Tucker.