Project Aware: Faculty Proposals Promote Diverse Curricula


by Anne Dolan

Three more curriculum development projects have been funded 
for the 1995-96 school year through Project Aware. Now in its 
third year, Project Aware is a competitive program sponsored 
by the Center for Teaching Excellence and the Provost's 
Office. Its goal is to assist faculty efforts to promote 
internationalization and multicultural awareness and create a 
climate in their classrooms and departments that is open to 
diversity. 

Faculty in the program receive a semester away from teaching 
responsibilities to carry out their proposals. Program funds 
go to the participants' departments to cover the cost of lost 
teaching time.

Following is a summary of the faculty participating in 
Project Aware and their projects.

Susan Cross, assistant professor of psychology. Cross will 
develop a 400-level, seminar-type course on cultural 
psychology, a relatively new area that looks at societal 
factors as molders of psychological processes. The course 
will expose students to international perspectives on 
psychological theories and to research conducted cross-
culturally (for example, in which an American concept or 
behavior is applied to another culture). Her work will 
include consulting with faculty from the approximately two 
dozen psychology departments around the country that already 
are teaching cultural psychology. She expects the new course 
to be ready for spring semester 1997.

Carol David, associate professor of English. During fall 
semester, David will search relevant literature for teaching 
tips to help teaching assistants (TAs) draw minority students 
into the collaborative style of learning. What she learns 
will be incorporated next fall into English 500, a semester 
course for all first-year TAs. 

David said isolated students don't get the educational or 
social experiences that make them feel better and perform 
better in school. Often, a compostion class may include a 
single minority student, who feels isolated and doesn't speak 
up in class, but also doesn't approach the TA for help. The 
problem may be compounded by the fact that the typical 
English TA is a white Midwesterner unaccustomed to working 
with minority students, she said.

"I don't think for a minute the reasons are the same for all 
minorities," David said. "And there are several camps out 
there on why they have trouble. I hope to find as many as I 
can."

Her research also will include interviews with all the 
college minority liaison officers.

Robert Leacock, professor of physics, and Mary Ann Evans, 
director of the Program for Women in Science and Engineering. 
They will develop a new course that identifies the 
contributions made by women and minority scientists to the 
physical sciences, possibly focusing only on physics. The 
course also will look at the social environments in which the 
scientists worked. Leacock said most of the recognition given 
to women and minority scientists to date is for 
accomplishments in the biological sciences. The course 
initially would be offered as an honors seminar and later as 
a physics course or a co-sponsored course, with Leacock 
focusing on the significance of the contributions to science 
and Evans focusing on the historical and social significance 
of the individuals.

For more information on Project Aware proposal deadlines for 
next year, contact Steve Richardson, Center for Teaching 
Excellence, 4-2402.

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contact:  Anne Dolan, Internal Communications, (515) 294-7065
updated:  7-28-95