What is a curriculum?

Engagement

One issue that seems to interfere with more productive discussions is a tendency to truncate those discussions by saying (in effect):

"I'm the expert in my area, just trust me."

Trust isn't the issue.

Mutual understanding is the issue.

Thus, we need to articulate those aspects of our areas that are unclear to others.

This MUST be a foundational assumption of our engagement.

Another impediment is the (inadvertent) use of jargon.

In our own disciplines or training in legacy/foundational disciplines,

we use terms to refer to very specific ideas.

However, since we come from such a diversity of areas, such specificity appears to be jargon.

That often interferes with real understanding.

Please take the time to explain what you mean and use "plain English."

---

What is an Undergraduate Curriculum?

Curriculum design is first about a structure that allows us to go forward.

What goes into the structure can and should evolve.

A curriculum, even if radical, is a conservative thing.

In particular, it conserves (and cultivates) key relations to society.

A great example in the current context is classical liberal arts, which cultivates a centuries long relation

concerned with creating a highly literate and critical population.

Our curriculum must prepare students for broad and meaningful future roles.

A curriculum is long lasting and is written in Plain English.

It uses categories that have longevity; typically, with at least a 20 year shelf life.

It must be understood, if at least in a general way, by all or most faculty at SFU.

A curriculum is built on a model comprised of categorizations.

The two viable categorizations currently are:

1. we are school of design with concentrations in three key artefact classes:

Story (media artefacts),

Interactive objects and environments (screen-based & off-the-desktop),

Information (human-centered computer systems),

or

2. we are a school of media, information and design.

If you have another suggestion, put it on the table.

Otherwise, choose one. We cannot discuss indefinitely.

We must move forward.

A curriculum has very little to do with individual faculty research interests.

This is because research work by its very nature is speculative and risky and may not pan out.

The purpose of an undergraduate curriculum is to help students gain sufficient knowledge of topics that have permanence.

The undergraduate curriculum should be comprised of core courses and tools that enable students

to get to research questions to begin with.

This is the way that universities function.

SIAT is not an island that is exempt from standard university expectations.

It is a well-tested university expectation that the undergraduate curriculum represents the broad consensus of what are the most important things to know.

Each class in an undergraduate curriculum contains a coherent subset of this consensus knowledge.

Virtual Reality* provides a great example of improper undergrad curriculum.

In the early 1990's, there was a call for VR classes at the undergraduate level,

despite the fact that there were very few working VR systems at the time,

and that the required equipment was at least $100,000.

By the late 90's it became evident that there were only a few successful VR applications, and the notion of VR undergraduate classes seemed pretty silly.

During that time, VR went from being a media darling to a niche of 3D computer graphics art and science.

To take an example for the Humanities: Stanley Fish is a prominent literary theroist who specialized

in reader-response criticism.

While at Duke, he DIDN'T organize an undergraduate curriculum in reader-response criticism,

though at the time it was a popular area of research.

There were a couple of classes IN literary criticism generally, AND students still actually read some of the books they criticized.

For my own example: I would love to hire someone like Eugene Thacker,

who is a international expert on biomedia and bio art.

I would love to have a curriculum that comprises the components of biomedia

(biology, bioinformatics, media studies/sci fi, tissue engineering an so on).

But this doesn't make sense for the reasons articulated above.

And, to be responsible, I have to keep focussed on the greater needs of the curricular and departmental needs.

We are missing or neglecting areas that first must be addressed, like visual design.

I'd rather teach classes on bioart than interactive visual design

(tho it's what I've been doing for the last 17 years), but hey.

Thus, I would add that: an undergraduate curriculum must exceed the desires of personal interests.

A curriculum is owned by the faculty of its school.

Collegiality is the collective sharing of power and is only stable when power is shared.

We hired a significantly large group of new colleagues.

They must be part of curriculum planning, just as Wave III hires will.

An undergraduate curriculum should commit less than 40% of the School's energy and faculty time.

There are much bigger fish to fry in making and sustaining an academic career.

"Bridge" Classes

As John Dill says, we are here (and not in more traditional departments) for a reason.

Let's see to what degree we can capitalize on that.

Which classes can be fruitfully taught across streams, with synergistic intent?

Such classes WILL be what sets us apart.

Core Skills

What skills are necessary for all SIAT students?

It will be more productive to discuss these in terms of skills, not classes. Please add to the list that is on the wiki.

http://wiki.iat.sfu.ca/ucrack

• VR, as it is defined in the majority view by all disciplines, means Immersive virtual reality.