Welcome to Digication Scholars Conversations.
I'm your host, Jeff Yan.
In this episode, you will hear Part One of my conversation with
Devon Thomas Jones and Thomas Murray from University of Arizona.
Devon and Tom are course directors for University 301, General
Education Portfolio, and University 101 Introduction to General
Education Experience, respectively.
They are both also Associate Professors of Practice at the W.
A.
Franke Honors College in the Office of General Education.
More links and information about today's conversation can be found on Digication's
Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.
Full episodes of Digication Scholars Conversations can be found on
YouTube or your favorite podcast app.
Welcome to Digication Scholars Conversations.
I'm your host, Jeff Yan.
My guests today are Devon Thomas Jones, course director of University
301, General Education Portfolio, and Thomas Murray, course director
of University 101, Introduction to the General Education Experience.
They are both Associate Professors of Practice at W.
A.
Franke Honors College and the Office of General Education
at University of Arizona.
Welcome.
Thank you.
Thanks.
We usually do one on one conversations, but I've always
known the both of you as a pair.
Um, I feel like we've always talked to both of you.
Um, and so, um, I thought it would, it would be just, uh, uh, be useful
to, to, to have both of you on Digication Scholars Conversation.
Um, Now, you both direct, um, two different, um, courses in the same sort of
Gen Ed program in University of Arizona.
Maybe for folks who are joining us who are not even aware of what does all this mean?
What is Gen Ed, University 101, 301?
These are all lingos that sometimes, you know, even folks that are in
higher education get confused.
Could you, like, tell us a little bit about what these, what these
courses are and what, what you do?
Sure.
Um, I think it's actually, it's interesting that you say a lot of
people might not understand all this is.
That's actually the purpose in some ways of both of our courses.
Um, it is to help students understand and make meaning of their General
Education coursework, um, which provides, uh, really broad and rich
foundation for, you know, whatever major or majors they might be pursuing.
So, our courses are actually designed to address that very issue at this
institution so that students know, you know, why are we doing this?
Like, what is the value of doing General Education?
How can I make it meaningful for myself?
How can I Describe to myself and others what it is that I've
learned so that they're getting the most benefit out of that General
Education program that they can.
Um, and it is, it's, it's two bookends, right?
Which is why Devon and I often appear simultaneously in the same spaces
because we're, we're, our courses are two sides of the same coin.
And, um, could you tell, like, let's step back even one step further.
It's not one step.
You know, further from, from, from that for people who don't know
what General Education is, right?
So we, you talked about, well, what's the value of General Education?
Let me give people some examples of what, what is General Education?
You know, if you've, if you, you are not in college yet, you are
thinking about attending college and you hear about General Education,
but you don't know what that is.
How does one even start to understand that?
Sure.
I love talking about this.
That's why Devon waited.
She knows, she knows that I love talking about this.
Um, so General Education is about developing the whole person.
It's about developing ways of thinking and ways of knowing that are not
just about Vocational trading, right?
Um, you know, students go to college, they want to get a really great career,
really great job out of it as they should.
Part of what supports that great career is the capacity to think outside of kind of
the narrow focus of what that career is.
So, At the University of Arizona, for example, we have four learning
outcomes for our General Education program, which are, um, Communicating
Effectively, Thinking Critically, Using Information Effectively
and Ethically, and Understanding and Valuing Differences, right?
So these, these learning outcomes describe skills that transcend
Any particular field, right?
No matter what field you're going into, your employer is going
to value your capacity to think critically and problem solve.
They're going to value your ability to communicate effectively in
writing, um, and speaking across contexts, across audiences.
And General Education courses help develop that capacity.
And the great thing is then you can, you can take these courses that have Any
number of topics to them, um, because in some ways the topics don't even matter.
It's the, it's the ways of thinking and doing that they're helping you
develop, um, that really matters.
So we, we have General Education courses at the U of A on zombies.
Uh, we have, um, some that are on like video games and video
games in societies, right?
And so these really broad topics, it doesn't really matter that
you're studying zombies, right?
What, What you're really learning about is how, through literature, humans
have created the idea of monsters and that way of thinking and, um,
understanding how humans, um, create differences between them, um, and
all sorts of ways of thinking that 20 years from now, you're going to forget
what you learned about zombies, right?
But the way of thinking stays with you.
And that's a, that's a really huge value of General Education.
I love that sense of these skills are durable and transferable
over a long period of time.
And that, um, it's not specific to disciplines and content that Actually,
I, I think that I, you know, I've been talking, you know, I, I have kids that
are sort of close to college age and you know, I talk to them and their
friends and I feel like sometimes there's this sort of notion that, you
know, when I go to college, I want to get a job at this, whatever, you know,
like give it a label, whatever that is.
And sometimes I think that there's this tension between that and
actually you also going there to learn to become a better learner.
And that, that may be even more important because that one skill that
you're mentioning now, um, that's going to change in the next five, 10
years, 15, 20 years for sure, right?
And that, and that your, your foundational skills to be able to learn is so much
more important because as those things change, um, those durable skills that
you were talking about, like, you know, communicating effectively, quick
to thinking critically, um, Being able to take information and what was
it, um, um, ethically and, uh, uh.
Effectively and ethically.
Effectively and ethically, um, and I forgot the last one, um.
Understanding and valuing difference.
Understanding, yeah.
And, and these are all things that, um, they're like evergreen topics, right?
There are things that will apply to us Not only for any specific content area,
but also just in life, in leadership, in relationships with people, um,
and finding meaning in general.
And so I, I, I think that there, you know, I think that there's, there is,
there is this weird tension of students today thinking about going to college,
attending college, and there's this idea that like, oh, I attend college.
What is your major?
You know, what am I going to get a job at?
Of course, there's the tension of also student loans and so on.
So you want to be able to pay it back, right?
You want to be able to afford it.
But, you know, They think about, you know, sort of that very practical
tension of, okay, if I'm going to be a nurse, why do I have to learn
how to do all these other things?
And the idea is, you know, and, and that's really what you guys do.
You're like, hold on a minute.
Actually, whether you want to be a nurse or an engineer or a lawyer
or a doctor, these are all things that's going to apply to you.
Right, right.
Well, and, and, um, A strong General Education foundation
cuts across industry, right?
And so to think about your General Education, um, typically, right, in U.
S.
uh, colleges and universities, this is a large component of your
degree requirement, um, anywhere from maybe a quarter to a third
of the number of credits that you need to complete your degree.
And we also know, right, that with an ever changing, like, job market and
industry and the way that things are changing and we're preparing folks to
graduate into careers that don't exist.
Um, it also then makes your degree more valuable because it makes it more
transferable to different industries.
So when you are studying to be a creative writer, the kinds of skill sets you
need Working for a law firm is going to maybe look a lot different than if
you're working in a marketing or ad agency, but being able to effectively
work on a team or delegate, like, those are things that are required in either
of those industries, and those are the kinds of skills and mindsets that you get
to practice and get a lot of experience in through your General Education.
So, yes, I think sometimes, um, it can feel like with the cost of
college and with the time to degree that the urgency around, well, I want
to get these things out of the way.
I want to complete my gen eds as fast as possible because I want to get to the, the
good stuff when I'm here to study, right?
Um, but rather if we can reframe it as, this is part of the value
that you get to take with you.
regardless of where you end up with your degree that, that adds a layer, um, of
transferability and applicability that may not exist if you end up taking, you know,
getting a degree in something and not actually then ending up in that industry.
No, I love that.
And I, I, I have a, I have a Something that I want to check with you on,
and this is something that I, I.
I feel like that I've heard a lot of people say, and I can hypothesize,
but I don't know whether you know people, you know, I mean, you are, you
are the pros here, you know, so you might, you have more to say about this.
I really feel like that for people who have gained these skills, right?
Like you said, top, the subject matter itself wasn't even the point of it.
You could be studying zombies, um, but.
Once you've gained these, you know, sort of foundational skills, you know,
to thinking, to be, to be someone who can, you know, who can think
critically, et cetera, it actually makes you more effective a learner,
whatever field you go into anyway.
So if we were to think about like your, roughly speaking, a four year
undergraduate education, I know people, you know, can fluctuate, you
know, those four years are not exact.
Um, That you spend some of some portion of the time developing these skills.
You'll spend some other times developing skills in specific,
you know, more narrow disciplines.
But the times that you actually, once you have these skills, when you go
into the disciplines, you're going to be a much more effective learner.
I believe that the net result is actually that you are better at everything.
Like the net benefit after four years, let's say, is Better than if you had
spent four years, day one, go to nursing 101 and you'd skipped all of this.
You would be a good nurse, but you would be a better nurse if you actually spent
some of that time, even half of that time in General Education, and then only spend
half the time in nursing because during the half, half the time being in nursing,
you're actually doing more like you're being more effective as a, as a learner.
What do you think about that hypothesis?
I completely agree with that because because nursing doesn't
happen in a vacuum, right?
Engineering doesn't happen in a vacuum.
You engineer for people.
You engineer for communities.
You engineer for cities, right?
You engineer in a, in a complex system.
You nurse in a complex system.
You teach in a complex system.
And so you need to understand and be able to interact with that
system, um, in, in complex ways.
Because if all you, if all you know are the technicalities of nursing,
That's a very limited understanding of what it means to be a nurse.
And the skills that you gain outside of your industry make
you that more complex thinker.
And I think Jeff, you, you mentioned earlier, it's not just about your career.
It's about your personal life.
It's about your relationships, right?
These, these skills that you develop in General Education go
way beyond the career, right?
It, It changes, you know, if you are an effective communicator, and in 15
years you decide that you want to be a volunteer coach for your kid's sports
team, that effective communication is going to benefit you as a coach
on your kid's sports team, right?
Um, so there's so much value to it other than, you know, You know, how
it's going to impact your career.
Right.
And I mean, Thanksgiving is coming up, um, you know, at that Thanksgiving
dinner table, if you want to effectively communicate with your, with your, your
family, um, that's, uh, then this will be a skill that, that, uh, you can come
back from, you know, college to use that.
Um, I, I want to, I want to pick up on that, um, Tom, a little
bit, maybe go a little bit in the, uh, Tangential sort of direction.
I think I agree with you.
A lot of these skills are, you know, applicable in so many ways, right?
I think that there is something that when I see your program and I see your
students work and, and some of the things that we've talked about, it's
also about getting students to have a sense of mission and purpose, a sense
of 'What am I doing in this world?'
What's going to make me feel a sense of fulfillment and joy?
Um, that goes beyond the financial rewards, the, even the, you
know, fame, basically beyond the fame and fortune, right?
Um, I, I, I sometimes think that maybe in the Western culture and in in the
United States, we don't, Talk about that so much, you know, um, but, but these
are things that I think that our students are, have been feeling, especially in the
last few years after COVID, especially after COVID after, um, um, you know,
these, you know, those years of sort of isolation and sort of trying to think
about meaning and, and it's sort of like a wake up call for everyone, right?
Um, And I, I, I have found a lot of people, young people are
actually having these conversations.
You know, some of it is about work life balance, but it's actually a lot
more about, you know, some of them are like, I, I, I don't want to, um, be an
engineer and just work on how to make a banner ad, you know, be more effective.
Um, even if that were going to pay you a lot of money,
um, they don't want that job.
They want something a little bit more meaningful.
That's a part of Conversation that I have with people that make gives me so
much hope and and optimism about the world But I think it really comes from
Opportunities that you are providing to your students through these courses.
Yeah, we have we have a lot of students who Um, when they get to U of A and
they, and they take, in a unit of one to one, when we're trying to get
them to explore things that they're interested in, they actually, in a lot
of ways, they're stymied by it, right?
Like, they, they're confused by the question.
When we ask them, like, what are you curious about?
What do you want to learn?
It actually, is a moment of panic for some of them because in 12 years of
formal education, some of them have never had an educator ask them, what
is it that you're curious about, right?
Um, and so it's this, this kind of aha moment for them of understanding
that what they're interested in, uh, has value and it's important.
And it can actually direct their learning and, oh my goodness,
maybe even make learning fun.
Um, it's, it's such a revelation for some of them.
Um, and I know on the, on the other end, you started off by talking about purpose.
I know that Devon's got plenty of examples of, of students who in the portfolio
process have kind of found that purpose.
Yeah.
And I think what we're hoping to do, um, You know, these, the courses that
Tom and I lead, right, um, are really asking students, um, to forefront,
like, what's in it for them, right?
And what have they learned?
And then how does that learning matter to them?
And I think that that is a pedagogical shift, uh, in mindset that Many
students are unfamiliar with because so much of it is tell me what I've
taught you and demonstrate that you know and have received the information.
And, um, it's not to say that that still doesn't happen, right?
But really to center, um, and put the responsibility on the student as the
learner and drivers of their meaning making, uh, gives purpose, uh, like
a new light and then in turn we know that when we understand why we're
doing something and what value it might offer me, I'm more like energized
to follow through on it, right?
It, it adds a layer of motivation and commitment to learning, um,
that may not exist otherwise.
Um, so I think that that's an exciting moment for students, um, and something
that We try to preserve, uh, as much as, right, in, in higher ed and
education, there's always external factors that place pressure on
curriculum, on, um, you know, standards of learning and things like that.
But to preserve the piece that the student is the primary agent and responsible for
their learning and we're here to support that learning, um, is something that we,
Keep close and in our work and our values.
Yeah.
Can I say something that I think people Really sometimes don't
realize what you all do is hard work.
It's really hard work You are you know, it's it's almost like to me.
It feels like if I were to compare, you know Here's ten things.
I just want students to remember them and then test them on it It almost
feels, Oh man, that would have been easy.
Right.
But what you guys do are saying, Oh no, we are trying to get to every person and
try to try to figure out who they each are, that they are going to come up with
answers that we, we, we have no idea.
We get, we have to read each of them, each, each one of them.
We have to understand each one of them.
We have to take into context and come up with a way to give them feedback, right?
That's a lot more work than just saying, what are the 10 correct answers?
I can just check it, yes or no, and then be done, right?
So I think that people sometimes almost, I almost feel like, you know, there's,
I talked to some students that go, well, I'm thinking about just going to
do this little bootcamp or whatever.
I'm not saying those things are bad.
I just think that they have no idea.
Like they're not even comparing apples to to this is apples and and trees, you
know, it's not even They're like in a different league or completely different
league And and so so so and speaking of hard work I want to talk a little bit
about the scale in which you do this in because I've heard people that go,
well, that'd be nice because you are in the, uh, Liberal Arts, you know,
program where you have 12 students in your class, you can all discuss and,
you know, have this like wonderful, you know, cohort and, and do all that.
Can you tell, Tell us a little bit about the scale in which you work in.
I mean, you have, by the way, everything you said is, you know,
is great, is personalized, is ambitious, is customized, right?
But at what scale?
Are we talking about like 30 students?
Are we talking about 50 students?
What are we talking about?
We're talking about a lot of students.
So our, our classes are capped at 27.
Students right now are individual sections of our classes, but, um, UNIV 101 is,
is, well, UNIV 101 and 301 are required for all students who are admitted as
first year students to the University of Arizona, which is about 9, 000 students.
Each fall, um, plus a few spring admits.
And now, you know, also with Arizona online, we have, um, you know, much
smaller, but still a population there.
Um, so scaling it was a challenge.
I mean, we, we piloted UNIV 101 with 14 sections in the spring of 22 and
had to scale it to like 340 sections.
in the space of four months.
Um, and so it's, it's a, it's a, it's a big lift, right?
And so, and three, you know, you know, 301 is probably, I don't
know, Devon, maybe a year away from being at full, kind of full growth.
And so we're, we're talking about 7 to 800 sections of...
between the two classes a year, um, and at 27 students a section, if you've
got some good quantitative reasoning skills, you can figure out it's a lot of
sections, and it's a lot of instructors.
Um, it's a lot of classroom space for, you know, one on one, which is in person.
Um, it's a lot of grading.
So, um, the scaling has been really big, um, but it can happen.
And we've heard the same thing, like, oh, it's, it, it can't, you can't do something
like that at an institution this size.
Well, you can if it's an institutional priority, right?
So I want people who are listening to realize how how
crazy this, these numbers are.
So we're talking about, it's not, we're not trying to like do this with, you
know, like 12 students in a class and that luxurious, you know, classroom.
We're talking about, you know, like 9, 000 students a year coming through.
Every single year.
So every single year you get 9, 000 fresh new students going through this process.
So that's, and that's in 101.
And so then you've got, you know, now six to seven a year who are going through 301.
So, so we're talking, you know, well north of 15, 000 students a
year go through The courses that you both direct and this is by all
means, it's, it's a huge team effort.
There's a lot of faculty members, a lot of, a lot of different folks, um, in it.
And in fact, I remember, um, seeing the, um, uh, You know, General Education
webpage at University of Arizona.
And there are like, I mean, the staff is like a huge list, um, you know,
just to just include everyone in there.
Right.
Um, there's, uh, there are many professors.
There are many assistants.
There are, there are, there are, there are a lot of people that, that make this work,
but you only can make it work because it's a priority for the institution.
So tell me about.
I'll tell all of us about why, like, how did that happen at University of Arizona?
General Education.
In some schools, it's always been called General Education.
In some schools, it's Liberal Arts studies.
Sometimes they're called, you know, something else.
Um, foundational programs or skills, you know.
There's all kinds of, you know, ways that people, different schools call it.
Um, I believe that you've had a General Education program for a long time.
But you, uh, Like you said, in 2022 started rolling out a new version of it.
I mean, this is a huge undertaking, right?
This is not a, this is one of those things that people think.
And I want to dismiss some myths, like college are doing the
same thing over and over again.
Well, they, I guess it depends on the scale and the, and the time
timeline you're talking about.
Sometimes they do the same things, but when, and they,
they're not sitting still either.
Um, and when something work, they do it for a while and then they, when
they realize that something needs to be changed, they actually make changes.
And, and this is a great example of an institution of your size, being able
to just go, we're gonna pick up this entire General Education program that's
been in existence for many years and we're gonna revamp the whole thing.
Right?
Can you tell us a little bit about that?
It must be, must be quite an effort.
I look it up.
Too many, too many.
I know.
It brings up a lot of memories.
I think, I think the most important thing for me to always keep in mind Um,
when I talk about the General Education refresh, is that it was done very
intentionally and in, and in many ways done in response to student feedback.
And I think that is really important because one of the values of our office of
General Education is really, um, focusing on the student experience and student
autonomy and, um, and what we learned.
from talking to students is that they, not surprisingly, didn't understand the
purpose of General Education, didn't understand why they had to do it, what
they were learning, what they had learned, and we really wanted the new program
to respond to those concerns, right?
We also wanted to respond to, you know, our Board of Regents, and we
wanted to respond to other external constituents, but, like, we want to
respond to these student issues that were being raised that, um, the students
weren't finding value in it, and one of the reasons why students weren't
finding value in it is because they were focused on content acquisition, right?
They were focusing on learning about zombies, and the fact that learning about
zombies is not practical information and making this mindset shift and
cultural shift at the institution from content to perspective taking, right?
That like, through learning about zombies, you develop an entirely new perspective
on history, on literature, on um, on the ways that that human storytelling
happens, like that perspective is the value of General Education as much or more
so as learning the thing about zombies.
Um, but that also you have to, you have to invest time and effort
in making meaning of it, right?
So students engage in a lot of reflection in these classes because that's the
process by which students make meaning of what they're learning, right?
That they, they have to think about what it is they experienced and
how that relates to other things that they've learned and how
they can apply it in the future.
Um, because without that, the perspective taking doesn't, doesn't really happen and
doesn't really have a whole lot of value.
Yeah.
In addition to that, right, we, in responding to the student feedback,
we also needed the faculty who are involved in teaching the bulk of the
General Education courses, right, and, and designing, you know, informing the
curriculum and the kinds of classes that are included in our General Education
to be invested in that process as well.
And one thing that.
You know, I, I feel is absolutely true for faculty and instructors who's,
like, the ones that teach our General Education are some of our best faculty and
instructors on this campus by far, right?
Like, they have the enthusiasm, the expertise, and the experience with
teaching students, and they bring that to the classroom, and we're proud
to getting them bought in on this new way of teaching and thinking.
Many of them were already doing this already, so it was a way to acknowledge
their work and to center effective teaching and learning in our General
Education curriculum that was maybe previously under recognized, right?
Um, and one of the benefits now that we're starting to see that we've been
facilitating, uh, these two Bookend courses is that then many of our faculty
and instructors who teach 101 or to teach 301 also teach General Education
classes and then students are taking their classes with them and they're
reading about, Oh, like I took this class with this person and they're
the author for my reading this week.
And then that faculty member is also connected to a network of professionals
and instructors and faculty from all across campus to share in their
teaching and and their pedagogy.
And then that informs how they then show up in their other classes,
their General Education classes or major or disciplinary areas.
So, it's taken a long time, right?
Like that kind of culture shift doesn't just happen when you
launch a new program, right?
But it takes a couple years because then, We get more folks
who are teaching the classes.
We have more students who are taking the classes.
And so then they also are starting to hear about it.
Right.
And it becomes a little bit more of like, this is what we do.
We, we engage in reflection.
We take our Gen Eds and we, you know, have an understanding of what, what I
can get out of it and how that connects.
Um, so it's a large effort to get it going, but then actually
to sustain the work and make it meaningful requires an ongoing.
Uh, faculty and instructional community, uh, to, to sustain
that work and to make it real.
Here's a preview of what's coming up next in part two of my conversation
with Devon Thomas Jones and Thomas Murray from University of Arizona.
Yes, is there something about being human that makes reflection somewhat natural?
Perhaps.
But it's a skill, right?
It's like any other skill.
The more you do it, the more intentional you are, the more practice you have.
The better you get.