History of General Education Discussions at the College of Charleston

Prior to 1970, the College of Charleston was a small, private, liberal arts college. The total enrollment was less than 600 students. The general education requirements listed in the 1969-1970 College Catalog reveal that the College offered a traditional liberal arts curriculum. In 1970, the College became a state supported institution and began to grow. By the early to mid seventies, enough new faculty had been hired so that a review of the general education requirements at the College was necessary. After a series of discussions involving the entire faculty, a set of general education requirements, essentially the same as those we currently have, were adopted. A copy of these requirements may be found in the 1996-1997 College Catalog.

The growth of the College has been remarkable and in the 1996-1997 academic year, the College has approximately 10,000 undergraduate and graduate students, about 350 tenure track faculty and offers several Master's Degrees. While the general education requirements remained the same during this period of growth, several developments pertaining to general education deserve mention. In the early 1990's, the State Commission on Higher Education mandated that all State Institutions estalish a continuous assessment of all programs. In order to assess a program, institutions must first establish goals and objectives for each program . So, in the 1994-1995 Assessment Report, which the College sent to the Commision of Higher Education, goals and objectives for the general education program are published. Based on these goals, the Assessment Committee surveyed Department Chairs to establish which general education courses met each goal and then in an extensive transcript analysis of the May 1994 graduates, sought to determine whether our graduates actually had curricular experiences designed to meet our stated goals.

Meanwhile, in a periodic updating of the College of Charleston Mission Statement, the Board of Trustees in February 1994 adopted a revised Mission Statement. Also, a group of four faculty and Sharon Pothering attended an AAC&U conference in Indianapolis, "Sustaining the Vitality in General Education" and returned with the realization that although our GenEd curriculum was not in crisis, it had not been comprehensively reviewed in over 20 years.

Probably as a result of these developments, a group of faculty and administrators, who became known as the General Education Study Group, began to meet and consider general education issues and how the entire College community could be brought into the discussion. These discussions led to the General Education Faculty Forum held in August 1995 on Sullivan's Island. The discussion at this forum centered on the AAC&U publication Strong Foundations: Twelve Principles for Effective General Education Programs. A summary of the discussions is available.

Because of the interest expressed by the faculty in the general education discussions, the faculty senate in March 1996 established the ad hoc General Education Committee to:

1. Convene and facilitate a three-year campus-wide discussion on General Education to be completed by August of 1999.

2. Make a report annually to the Faculty Senate and a full report to the Faculty Senate and full faculty by the end of three years (1999) at which time the faculty will be asked to affirm or modify the General Education curriculum.

3. At the end of three years, make a recommendation to the Faculty Senate as to the need for a standing General Education Committee.

The ad hoc General Education Committee initiated the campus-wide discussion with a Faculty Forum in August 1996. (See the Provost's welcoming remarks.) Small groups of faculty were formed and called Inquiry Groups. The Inquiry Groups discussed the following questions during the Fall 1996 semester.

1. What is the Nature of an Educated Person?
2. How can a College Experience Facillitate the Development of an Educated Person?
3. What should be the Goals of the General Education Program at the College of Charleston?

As the Inquiry Groups met, summaries of the discussions were posted to the GenEd mailing list so that all faculty, staff, and students who subscribe to the mailing list could monitor the progress of the discussion. Also the summaries of the discussion were stored in this Web page under Inquiry Group Summaries - Fall 1996.