2021-2022 Undergraduate Catalog 
    
    Nov 23, 2024  
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2021-2022 Undergraduate Catalog [ARCHIVED CATALOG]

The College Core Curriculum

(As of fall 2016)

The College Core Curriculum is the program of studies designated by the faculty as essential for providing students with the necessary resources for initiating a lifelong engagement in the study of the liberal arts.  All courses are designed to help Iona students achieve those goals which derive from Iona’s educational philosophy.  In particular, these courses provide students with skills and knowledge that help them to understand and live in the modern world.

Mission of the Core Curriculum

The Iona College Core Curriculum commits to the ideals of liberal education through the provision of a common learning experience that prepares students for ethical, engaged citizenship and lifelong learning through the lenses of diversity, sustainability, and a global perspective.  Framed by the values of peace, justice, and service, the content-rich, interdisciplinary liberal arts curriculum is cohesively structured and characterized by an emphasis on the skills of critical thinking and literacy in its many forms.  Aspiring to the ideal of full intellectual engagement, the Core Curriculum seeks to facilitate students’ ability to question and challenge accepted wisdom.  Iona College’s dynamic Core Curriculum promotes the use of high impact educational practices designed to foster deep learning experiences that support students in pursuit of the knowledge and skills needed to thrive as citizens and prospective leaders in an ever-changing world.

CORE STUDENT LEARNING OUTCOMES

Through engagement with “big questions” grounded in the liberal arts, students will demonstrate knowledge of the meaning and complexities of the human experience and its relationship to the natural world.  

Through immersion in a nurturing community dedicated to intellectual engagement, students will demonstrate the skills needed to thrive as citizens and prospective leaders in an ever-changing world. Such skills include:

        Critical inquiry and analysis (2.1/2.3)

        Critical reading (2.2)

        Critical thinking (2.4a)

        Problem-solving (2.4b)

        Written communication (2.5)

        Oral communication (2.6)

        Quantitative literacy (2.7)

        Informational and technological literacy (2.8)

        Teamwork and collaboration (2.9)

Through a comprehensive curricular experience that emphasizes the values of peace, justice, and service, as well as appreciation for human diversity, sustainability, and civic engagement, students will demonstrate the ability to apply a global perspective and the principles of ethical reasoning.

        Human Diversity (3.1)

        Civic Engagement (3.2)

        Ethical Reasoning (3.3)

        Global Perspective (3.4)

Through participation in a cohesive and interdisciplinary core, students will demonstrate the capacity to synthesize and adapt knowledge, skills, and responsibilities to new settings, questions, and specialized studies.

The College Core consists of 15 courses in 6 areas and an Integrated Core Theme

  1. Columba Cornerstone - one course
  2. English Composition - one course
  3. Humanities - five courses (one three-credit course in each area: Fine and Performing Arts, History, Literature*, Religious Studies, and Philosophy) *Literature course may be taught in English or in a Foreign Language, in a course studying literature.
  4. Social Science and Business - two courses: Students take two three-credit courses in this area, with at least one course taken from Economics, Political Science, Psychology or Sociology. (Business, Economics, Entrepreneurship, Political Science, Psychology, and Sociology)
  5. Science/Technology/Math - three courses (one course in each area: Computer Science, Mathematics, and lab-based Science)
  6. Diversity, Cross-Cultural, and Global Perspectives - two courses (one three-credit courses in Foreign Language; one three-credit course chosen from the following: Black Studies, Business Economics, Business Law, Communication Sciences and Disorders, Criminal Justice, Economics, English, Film, Fine and Performing Arts, Geography, History, Management, Media & Strategic Communication, Political Science, Psychology, Religious Studies, Sociology, Social Work, Women’s Studies)
  7. Integrated Core Theme - every student is required to complete one integrated core theme.  An Integrated Core Theme (ICT) is a set of four courses based on an interdisciplinary topic (e.g. Violence or Identity).  The ICT consists of a Humanities Centerpiece course and three integrated courses. The intentional connection of courses to a Humanities Centerpiece course is a unique feature of Iona’s Core Curriculum. The Humanities Centerpiece course is developed and taught by the departments of English, History, Philosophy, Religious Studies and Foreign Languages.  The Centerpiece Course will introduce students to the “big questions” of the Integrated Core Theme. The centerpiece course should be instrumental in establishing an intellectual framework for the ICT.

Specific Requirements

The requirements of the College core are ordinarily met by taking the prescribed courses.  In exceptional cases, students may, according to the discipline involved, either substitute a higher-level course or satisfy the requirement by demonstrating accomplishment of the goal of the requirement.  The procedure for applying for an exception is explained in, “Adjustments to the College Core .”

I. The Columba Cornerstone

A First-year Experience

The Core Curriculum provides a common learning experience steeped in the rich tradition of the liberal arts and its foundation is the Columba Cornerstone, Iona College’s first-year seminar. Saint Columba (521-597 CE), an early medieval monk, founded a center of learning, culture and spirituality on the Isle of Iona off the west coast of Scotland. The historic name of the learned Columba invokes the approach to the whole person and the integration of learning in which Iona College seeks to educate its students. Students will develop an appreciation for the interrelatedness among and connections across areas of inquiry early in their Iona experience. These seminars will be a thematically-based gateway to inquiry and engagement.

The Columba Cornerstone course, COL 150 , serves as the foundation for a student’s intellectual engagement as a member of the Iona community. Taken in the first semester, the three-credit, theme-based Cornerstone is linked and integrated with another course to form a learning community in which students will examine the designated theme through an interdisciplinary lens. Structured to promote students’ critical thinking, the Cornerstone course emphasizes reading, writing, speaking and collaboration, and explores the many facets of human diversity. All sections within the particular Cornerstone theme share a common text and an overview of critical thinking. To augment classroom-based learning, each Cornerstone integrates experiential and instructional co-curricular modules that serve as unifying elements across all sections of Cornerstone courses. Students are required to engage in a minimum of two co-curricular activities.

The Columba Cornerstone introduces students to time-honored questions in the liberal arts through the themes of Truth and Equity, Justice and Equity, and Earth and Equity. Using these particular themes, students will explore questions about the nature of knowing, dive deeply into analyses of identities, and probe the many dimensions of human interrelatedness. Grounded firmly in the mission statement of the Core Curriculum, the Columba Cornerstone will introduce students to critical concerns of our time such as diversity and sustainability in a digitally and globally connected world. Motivated by the values and goals of peace, justice, and service, the Cornerstone will utilize classic and contemporary texts, co-curricular engagements, and a variety of pedagogies to consider new approaches to traditional problems and cutting-edge insights for the 21st century.

All sections of the Columba Cornerstone, COL 150 , regardless of theme (i.e., Truth and Equity, Justice and Equity, Earth and Equity) incorporate instruction on essential topics which have been designed to provide a foundation that will support students throughout their Iona experience. These topics include: The Iona Story; Diversity; Information and Digital Literacy; Entrepreneurship and Innovation; and basic Financial Literacy.

Newly entering first-time freshmen must take the Columba Cornerstone (COL 150 ) in their first semester as part of a learning community. Transfer students whose college core curriculum requirements have been waived still must take the Columba Cornerstone as a requirement of graduation. These transfer students ordinarily register for a free-standing Columba Cornerstone in their first semester, but must complete the requirement no later than their second semester at Iona College.

 

II. English Composition

One course in written communication - ENG 120 , ENG 122 , or its approved equivalent

III. Humanities

All Iona College students are required to take one course in each of the following areas:  Fine and Performing Arts, History, Literature, Philosophy, and Religious Studies.

 

Fine and Performing Arts Core Course Choices

Choose 1

Literature Core Course Choices

Choose 1

History Core Course Choices

Philosophy Core Course Choices

Religious Studies Core Course Choices

IV. Social Sciences and Business

All Iona College students take two three-credit courses in this area, with at least one course taken from Economics, Political Science, Psychology or Sociology.

Social Science and Business Core Course Choices

V. Science, Technology and Mathematics

All Iona College students are required to take one course in each area of computer science, mathematics, and lab science.

Computer Science Core Course Choices

Mathematics Core Course Choices

Laboratory Science Core Course Choices

VI. Diversity, Cross-Cultural and Global Perspectives

All Iona College students are required to take two courses in this area.  One course must be in a foreign language and one course must be in a course that does not focus on the acquisition of a foreign language.  To qualify for the Diversity, Cross-Cultural, and Global Perspectives core requirement, each course’s inclusive content and student learning outcomes should embody and assess one or more of these three elements (diversity, cross-cultural, and global perspectives). Foundational to each course is the integration of intercultural perspectives, potentially transcending traditional teachings in that discipline’s history and development. In doing so, an expanded consciousness and understanding relative to that respective field or discipline is sought for the students, of and for, complex social contexts, identities, communities, and cultural groups.

Foreign Language Core Course Choices

Diversity, Cross-Cultural and Global Perspectives Core Course Choices

VII. Integrated Core Theme

The available ICT’s are:

  1. Violence
  2. Identity: Persons, Societies, and Cultures
  3. Innovation and the Creative Mind
  4. Women: Sex, Gender, and Society
  5. Sustainability and the Green Mind
  6. Society and the Scientific Mind
  7. Revolutions: Real, Imagined, and Digital

Please find complete information on these ICTs below.

The construct of the theme is framed in the following way:

A Humanities Centerpiece course provides the intellectual framework for the ICT. One Humanities Centerpiece is chosen by the student from the choices provided.

A student chooses three integrated courses from the list provided below the Centerpiece courses. Of the three integrated courses used for the theme, only one may be in the same discipline as the Centerpiece.

No more than two courses from the same discipline/department (as defined by the three-letter subject designation, e.g.: MTH) may be taken in the entire set of four courses within the ICT.

Integrated courses may be core, major, minor, or elective courses. Integrated courses are not counted in the 45 credits of the Core Curriculum and thus can count toward major, minor, or elective credit.  This structure allows for continued growth in integrating knowledge across disciplines.  Similarly, if an integrated course is also a core course, then it counts toward the appropriate core credit even as it fulfills the requirements of an ICT.

Violence

This ICT explores violence and non-violence as historical and societal realities, strategies, and psychological inclinations. Violence and non-violence are studied through the lens of a variety of disciplines and discourses that engage questions about human nature, the history and nature of civilization, and the impact of violence on society.

Centerpiece: HST 345  or ENG 353  or RST 318  

Identity: Persons, Societies, and Cultures

This ICT explores the theme of both individual and collective identity and their various points of contact. Particular attention is paid to investigating identity as socially and culturally constructed, and the ways in which such a socially and culturally constructed identity may be in tension with notions of individual inclination and will. Instead of taking individual and collective identity as a given set of unchanging qualities, students will consider the shifting relationship among identity, contact, and belonging, and their responsibility for the formation of their own personal, cultural, and spiritual identities.

Centerpiece: ENG 352  or HST 337  or PHL 304  or RST 328  

Innovation and the Creative Mind

This ICT introduces students to the interdisciplinary nature of innovation, creativity, and entrepreneurial thinking. Innovation advances every academic field, though it may take different forms and produce different outcomes from discipline to discipline. Courses in this ICT demonstrate the historical, societal, artistic, and scientific importance of innovation and creativity, and help students apply creative and entrepreneurial processes to problems in disparate areas of study.

Centerpiece: ENG 354  or PHL 320  or RST 370  or HST 304 

Women: Sex, Gender, and Society

This ICT explores issues of gender equality as well as gender biases and oppressions that are concealed under the disguise of habits and traditions. Courses will examine the social movements and intellectual approaches that help uncover hidden biases. When hidden biases are made explicit and when structural oppressions are articulated, students can identify a path toward gender equality and justice in our societies. By taking a set of courses that is sensitive to feminist concerns and justice for women, students will be able to challenge gender assumptions and inequalities that continue to plague our world.

Centerpiece: ENG 384  or PHL 354  or RST 330 

Sustainability and the Green Mind

This ICT offers students an integrated understanding of the various factors challenging the sustainability of human life in the cosmos. Students will evaluate humankind’s impact on the environment, to assess and plan for its care and protection. The interplay among the scientific, ethical, business, spiritual, political, historical, social, and policy dimensions of the crisis confronting continued life on earth will be studied.

Centerpiece: RST 341  

Society and the Scientific Mind

This ICT explores how science and scientific thinking influence social issues, cultural controversies, and intellectual arguments. Students will cultivate the scientific mind and apply the scientific method through an engagement with disciplines from the humanities, sciences, and social sciences. Students will identify the many ways science frames and gives meaning to our experience, consider what is distinctive about scientific thinking, and reflect on our shared responsibility to cultivate and practice it.

Centerpiece: PHL 365  or RST 406  or ENG 348  

Revolutions: Real, Imagined, and Digital

This ICT explores how revolution is understood in particular times and places, and its roles in the past and present. The world in which we live was created by numerous political, social, cultural, intellectual, and economic upheavals. Iona College itself is directly connected to these trends through its Institute for Thomas Paine Studies (ITPS). We are also witnessing a profound and rapid transformation of information and communications technologies that alter the modes in which we study the humanities. The examination of the ICT theme will be enhanced in the Humanities Centerpiece courses by addressing media and information literacy skills that are an essential component of the digital humanities.

Centerpiece: HST 316  or ENG 454  

VIII. Written and Oral Intensive Course Requirements

All Iona College students are required to complete 2 WI and 2 OI courses as part of their degree requirements (the Columba Cornerstone does not fulfill this requirement).

Written Intensive

Oral Intensive

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