Core Requirement Encourages Diversity

In an age of globalization and diversified ideology, many colleges and universities around the United Sates are looking for ways to better integrate cultural diversity into their curriculums. Boston College is no exception. The cultural diversity core requirement at BC represents the administration's desire to create a steppingstone for global discussion and diverse interaction, both academically and beyond the classroom.

The last major core curriculum reform took place in June of 1991, when a task force of Jesuits, professors, and administrative officers was assembled to review what many consider to be the backbone of BC academia.

Richard Cobb-Stevens, a professor in the philosophy department and the most recent director of the task force, said he believes that the most substantial augmentation to the curriculum in 1991 was the introduction of a cultural diversity requirement. "There were worries that it wouldn't be possible, but BC supported the effort and got more faculty involved," he said.

The immense support by the Boston College faculty to broaden ideological and cultural horizons eased the introduction of the cultural diversity requirement into the core curriculum. "At the time, the idea of being too Western was prevalent," Cobb-Stevens said. "International students were entering the school in larger numbers."
The new core curriculum was introduced only to freshmen at the time and was maintained for each class that entered after that year. Introducing the plan over a four-year period made it much easier, Cobb-Stevens said.

After the committee's initial decision to add a cultural diversity requirement, Cobb-Stevens and the committee was asked to develop around 150 courses to satisfy the new core.

According to the 1991 Core Curriculum Task Force Final Report, the cultural diversity courses could be designed, "as departmental offerings or as interdisciplinary courses and could approach the culture in various ways."

"What we try to do is follow the original committee's decision on what makes a cultural diversity course," Cobb-Stevens said.

Looking to the future, he said the curriculum will likely be reviewed in order to create more offerings that integrate different aspects of the core into a single course. "Ideally education should be something where all the courses are related."

Programs such as Perspectives and PULSE, both running under the theology and philosophy departments, currently allow students to engage in the integration of more than one aspect of the core curriculum through a single course.

"My dream would be to have more programs like that, which in a way sort of give greater unity to students' core experiences," Cobb-Stevens said.

In terms of the cultural diversity requirement, Cobb-Stevens hopes that more departments will offer courses that incorporate cultural aspects. He referenced the possibility of a math course based on the origins of mathematic symbols and calculations from ancient Egyptian and Greek cultures.

Dean of A&S David Quigley, said he felt similarly about courses that cross departmental lines, including those that touch upon cultural diversity.

 "When the core was reviewed, the one particular addition that stood out was the cultural diversity core," Quigley said.

Quigley said that this cultural diversity aspect of the core allows the level of academia on campus to keep up with large developments in a global society. "Our students engage diverse classmates in a diverse tradition. [The cultural diversity requirement] links that diversity to the intellectual foundation across the core."

Quigley also said he is optimistic about the diversification of disciplines throughout the University. Courses are now more thematically and topically diverse, he said.
Although the addition of the cultural diversity core was a principal change to the core curriculum, Quigley said he believes that this requirement is only part of a larger movement. "It is not the great litmus test of the University's interest in diversity," Quigley said. "There is a range of ways in which faculty and the University can express a commitment and value to diversity as they engage students."

In general, the BC community has responded positively to the cultural diversity aspect of the core, administrators said.

Cobb-Stevens has organized several discussions in which students pursuing different majors are invited to share their experiences in the presence of administrators and fellow students. The administrators do not participate in these discussions, allowing the students to voice their opinions openly.

"Many say that the core really opened them up; some even changed their major," he said. "The cultural diversity requirement is generally liked."

Quigley, who has attended similar student discussions, said that he has the same sense as well.

"I think that cultural diversity is an important aspect of the community both in and out of the classroom," said Michael Pascoe, A&S'12. "It's good for students who might not experience a culturally diverse academic environment within their major."

The initial statements in the 1991 Final Report of the Task Force reads, "A critical component of a liberal education is the capacity to see human experience from the point of view of others who encounter and interpret the world in significantly different ways."
After 18 years of the cultural diversity core requirement, Cobb-Stevens said the requirement has been effective in enabling those attitudes, "I'd like to think that it has opened people up to non-western thought, and on a more practical level I hope this program is influencing how different cultures interact with each other."