By Amelia Heymann

Virginia Commonwealth University’s ConnectED program serves students pursuing any course of study by helping them develop critical thinking skills and a more rounded view of the world. As it prepares for its annual symposium next week, program leaders are highlighting both its value and the widening embrace of its purpose.

The State Council of Higher Education for Virginia requires college students to take 30 hours of general education instruction, which focus on “skills and goals that are important regardless of major,” said Ananda Newmark, Ph.D., an associate professor of teaching in VCU’s School of Social Work and co-chair of the General Education Assessment Committee.

“These are all skills that have application for all undergraduate students, but as they move through their program and curriculum, they then understand how that has application in their major,” Newmark said. “And beyond that … we want [our students] to be good citizens.”

Since ConnectED began, he said, he has noticed a shift in students’ perception of the courses – that they are more than just a check-the-box requirement. This semester, ConnectED faculty met with nearly 170 students, and they were able to articulate the purpose of the program as well as the elements that appealed to them.

“There are meaningful outcomes that they see are connected to … their major” and to their college experience overall, Newmark said.

ConnectED is holding its fourth annual symposium on April 30, where faculty and students will spotlight the program’s value. The theme – “Actionable Insights, Strategies and Techniques for Our Classroom” – reflects how evidence-based findings into VCU student learning point to techniques that enhance instruction.

Virginia Wray Totaro, an associate professor in the Department of Focused Inquiry and co-chair of the General Education Assessment Committee, said the “durable skills” taught through ConnectED – communicative fluency, critical and creative problem-solving, ethical reasoning, global and cultural responsiveness, and information literacy – are meaningful to students as well as to faculty who teach them.

“When done right,” she said, “ConnectEd provides opportunities for faculty members to embrace and understand [how their course] can have a positive impact on how students move through their major courses.”

Carolina Yáber, Ph.D, an associate professor in the Department of Biology and co-director of the General Education Program, emphasized how student success in ConnectEd courses can power their upperclass years at VCU and beyond.

“That is what is going to make them a strong candidate when they apply to internships, upper-level courses within their [majors] or when they apply to jobs,” she said.

The ConnectED curriculum touches on fields ranging from STEM to the liberal arts. This exposes students to a diversity of courses, students, issues and concerns they may not typically experience within a single academic major.

Holly Jackson, Ph.D., co-director of ConnectED and director of the Business Essentials Unit within the School of Business, said that as an instructor, she values watching students understand subjects through the lens of disciplines outside of their primary course of study.

“It enriches not only how they start to view real-world problems, but it also allows them to better understand how business can mix with science and how all of these things can be really and truly interrelated,” Jackson said.