The University of Connecticut plans on adding a new curriculum this fall semester, the Common Curriculum Chair, Pamela Bedore said at the Oct. 7 University of Connecticut Senate meeting.
According to Bedore, the new Common Curriculum guidelines were approved in 2022, and will be launched on Aug. 25, 2025, for the 2025 fall semester at UConn. The curriculum differs from the current General Education curriculum by using topics of inquiry (TOI) instead of content areas.
According to the Common Curriculum guidelines, there are six required TOIs for students enrolled in the Common Curriculum: TOI-1, Creativity, Design, Expression, and Innovation; TOI-2, Cultural Dimensions of Human Experiences; TOI-3, Diversity, Equity and Social Justice; TOI-4, Environmental Literacy; TOI-5, Individual Values and Social Institutions; and TOI-6, Science and Empirical Inquiry. The guidelines also establish the five competencies required in the Common Curriculum: quantitative skills, second language proficiency and writing as well as two additional competencies: Information, Digital, and Media Literacy and/or Dialogue.
There are 16 faculty navigators, according to Bedore, and over 30 members of the Common Curriculum committee. They meet weekly or biweekly. This summer, faculty navigators worked on course approvals, according to Bedore. The committee approved well over half of the courses moving into the Common Curriculum. This academic year the committee has met three times and has worked on policy review. Bedore said they are still looking for new courses for the Common Curriculum.
According to Bedore, the committee has their course development grant and plans to meet their Nov. 22 deadline for the Provost Grant. According to the University Senate Common Curriculum website, the course development grant is used to revise existing courses transferring into topics of inquiry. The Provost Grant will go towards creating new courses which will carry a TOI.
“We think we’re in really, really good shape in terms of our enrollment capacity to launch the Common Curriculum,” said Bedore.
To communicate the new Common Curriculum, the committee is working with Early College Experience, eCampus and the transfer office, according to Bedore. The subcommittee, headed by the Executive Director for Undergraduate Programs Office, Brandy Nelson, is creating materials for the launch and has started speaking with advisors, said Bedore. Bedore did not elaborate on these partnerships.
“One of the questions a lot of people ask us is, are we going to have two curricula going on at the same time?” said Bedore. “The answer to that is yes, we’re going to have students in General Education and students in the Common Curriculum in the same classes.”
The committee reviewed three different proposals which establish aspects of the new curriculum. The skill code proposal of Nov. 2022 proposed that each TOI be given a letter which will be added to the course title, similar to the General Education curriculum adding a W next to writing courses. The committee decided against the proposal, said Bedore.
Another proposal reviewed was a student experience of teaching assessment proposal, which would establish course objectives on the student experience of teaching form. This proposal will be sent to faculty standards, which works with SET assessment according to Bedore. The last proposal was the block transfer proposal, which is the idea that students who have completed an associate’s degree or credits at another college can transfer those as a block. The committee has begun reviewing the block transfer proposal, according to Bedore.
“Currently there is no reserve capacity option for 1000 level courses in the bylaws of the Common Curriculum,” said Bedore. For the current General Education curriculum, as many seats as necessary can be reserved for W courses, 50 percent of seats for 2000 level courses for majors and no seats for 1000 level courses. Bedore claimed the university is not in compliance with these terms, meaning professors can often reserve caps on 1000 level courses. The bylaws for the new curriculum may be revised, said Bedore.
University Senator Martha Cutter expressed her concern about reserve caps, questioning if students who are required to take certain 1000 level courses will be able to enroll in their required courses before the course reaches capacity. Bedore said that the bylaw for 1000 level courses in the General Education curriculum has not been enforced, but the bylaw in the Common Curriculum will be. She said that they are still trying to determine a reserve cap number.
The committee is currently preparing for the assessment plan, doing more accessibility review and preparing to include the student learning objectives for all Common Curriculum courses for Fall 2026. Today, the committee is charging a new subcommittee to look at the two new competencies that will be used throughout the curriculum, Information, Digital, and Media Literacy and/or Dialogue. This Spring, the focus will shift to prepare for teaching in the new Common Curriculum, said Bedore. Essential partners, a group that focuses on teaching dialogue, will be on the Storrs campus Jan. 15 and 16 to hold a workshop on using dialogue in the classroom, said Bedore. A course design retreat will be held at the Storrs campus on May 14 for an event for Provost Grant winners and respective participants who are interested.
The new Common Curriculum webpage was launched this year and features a countdown to the Common Curriculums kickstart.