Gen Ed 12
This course supports the development of student success skills, such as reading, writing, and speaking; helps students gain intellectual confidence; builds in the expectation of academic success; and provides assistance in making the transition to university life. The course provides an orientation to the mission and core competencies of the Honors Program, and strengthens the interaction and sense of community among first-year honors students. Students will analyze and categorize leadership, research, and global citizenship themes, identify appropriate learning goals, and develop an e-portfolio for their use in the Honors Program.
Gen Ed 1a
ENG101 supports the Honors research competency by teaching critical reading, writing, and research skills. The course emphasizes reading texts carefully, summarizing others’ ideas accurately, integrating material selectively, and communicating effectively. The course teaches students to adapt their language practices based on their audience, purpose and context, and it supplies them with a toolkit of transferrable writing strategies from which to select when faced with a rhetorical situation.
Gen Ed 7, Gold Course
This course promotes an understanding of the impact of physical and mental disabilities on people in their daily lives through in-class contacts and exercises with and about persons with disabilities. The disability experience is examined at both the personal and societal levels.
Gen Ed 5 and 7, Purple Diversity Course
This course co-sponsored by the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences and the College of Graduate Studies and Research
This course will study social problems in a unique and highly interactive classroom that takes place at the women’s prison in Shakopee, Minnesota. MSU Honors College students will combine in a classroom with women participating in the educational program at the prison to provide an opportunity for both groups of students to examine the topic of social problems with the advantage of a very diverse set of perspectives. Each week, students will come together after having read the week’s materials, and create a vigorous dialogue that allows each of the participants to consider a wide range of views. Students will learn to examine social problems using social constructionism, an approach that highlights how people and communities come to recognize, define, and respond to social problems in the various ways they do. Students will also learn about the dynamics of unequal power relations between groups in society and how this inequality is relevant to understanding social problems. The course will include the study and analysis of news media presentations and their influence on the ways in which individuals understand and respond to social problems. Learning to analyze information about social problems will provide students with effective tools to better understand the multitude of social problems facing our world today, which in turn will make students more empowered citizens in their own communities.
This course co-sponsored by the College of Science, Engineering, and Technology, and the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences
This course will cover the concepts associated with Game Theory and associated applications in technology, economics and public policy. The seminar addresses the leadership and research competency areas. Students will discuss the global impacts of the application of Game Theoretic methods in global organizations/industries and governments and the aspects of using Game Theory to affect relationships and interactions among different groups including international groups. Research methods will also be discussed and since Game Theory is fundamentally and mathematically-based theory, students will have ample opportunity to explore the application of problem definition and problem solving to general problem scenarios during the course. This will be a team-taught course and will include frequent in-class interactive exercise. Game Theory allows one to consider many scenarios with multiple players and this will allow the students to become actively immersed in the topics.
To thrive in today’s information rich society, students need information literacy, or the ability to recognize an information need and to locate, evaluate, and effectively use needed information. By the end of this course, students will exhibit how to effectively find, evaluate, and synthesize information for academic research. Students will explore a variety of information tools, resources, and ethical dilemmas as they enter the community of scholars. The work produced in this course will help students prepare for undergraduate research projects.
This course will provide opportunities for in-depth investigation into leadership styles and methods, aiming to guide discovery and development of each student’s personal mentor philosophy. Students will apply their mentor philosophies throughout the semester by collaborating with and guiding new Honors students through various mentoring opportunities. Students participating in this course will be expected to work together to help create these mentoring opportunities, as well as be available and open to other students as mentors in the Honors Program. The goals of this course are to help students discover mentor qualities, to guide students to become more comfortable and confident with what it means to be a mentor, to utilize students’ strengths and weaknesses to build their individual mentor philosophy, to provide opportunities for students to practice their mentor philosophies, and to contribute to student portfolio development in leadership competencies
This required course for seniors in the program allows the student to articulate where and how he or she has met the Honors Program Learning Outcomes.
Leaders of Tomorrow is an innovative leadership program that combines hands-on practical leadership skills training and self-discovery with the opportunity to connect with greater Mankato. Participants will attend professional networking, educational, special and select Young Professional events.
Gen Ed 1C, 7 and 11
This course involves the study of interpersonal skills, motivation, and group skills applied to diverse groups in professional settings. Students will understand opportunities and challenges about diversity in a multicultural society. Course participants will recognize and appreciate the contributions, culture, norms/value, and oppression which groups experience. Students will develop communication skills, learn to build positive and equitable environments, and practice dealing with conflict. The coursework requires 18 hours of Service Learning field experience outside of class. The coursework also requires 20 pages of writing to improve skill in communicating with academic audiences. The honors section of the course includes an intercultural partnership and ethnographic study, a research paper on the culture and experience of a culture different than one's own, and a reflection paper about one's own cultural autobiography. Students will complete the course with the possibility of two papers to select for their portfolio.
Gen Ed 8 and 9
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be from a different country? If you aren't from the U.S., have you ever wondered where Americans get their ideas about people from other cultures? In either case, are you curious about how and why different cultures express their ideas about masculinity and femininity through dress, behavior, laws, work, relationships, food, culture? Global Perspectives on Women and Change gives students the opportunity to investigate the conditions, cultures, and changing status of women around the world. This course provides an overview of the rise of the "first" and "third world" nations, the struggles of women for full citizenship, as well as addressing topics such as women and work, sexuality, health, and violence against women. We also investigate the challenges women have faced and the continuing activism and change initiated by women in response to their complex worlds.
Students will acquire knowledge of the history of the struggle for women's rights globally. Students will gain the ability to think critically about the ways colonialism, ethnocentrism, sexism, racism, classism, and homophobia (among others) function in societies around the world. Students will learn to engage with theories of gender and sexuality. Students will develop speaking skills through required class participation and presentations; seminar skills through the ability to engage in respectful debate through speech and writing; and they will apply their new knowledge of feminist theory to an analysis of a situation facing women in a specific world region.
This course will examine women’s lives and activism, past and present, throughout the world. We will explore and evaluate individual and collective efforts to achieve social justice in the context of interlocking systems of oppression.
Gen Ed 2
This course will introduce students to psychological issues in society that affect their lives, behaviors, and the way they think. Students will be required to critically address current issues through intensive writing, research, discussion, and presentations. Course goals include:
This course focuses on both theoretical and applied aspects of persuasion. Specifically, the aim of this course is to apply theories and research findings in the area of persuasion to the development of social campaigns. Students will select a social issue of interest to them (e.g. recycling, healthy eating, etc.), research the issue to analyze what has been done so far to promote the issue, and collect data through surveys to understand and select the target audience and develop campaign strategies. The campaign strategies will be theoretically grounded. Finally, students will develop plans for monitoring, implementing, and evaluating the campaigns.
The premise of this honors seminar is that leadership always occurs in specific contexts, and that one’s ability to identify, compare, contrast, and assess different leadership models in historical contexts will help us in our own journey toward identifying our own personal values, in making effective decisions, and in working in teams. To do this, the seminarians will study several significant leaders in world history across various eras, including Classical Greece and Rome, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, and into the modern period. While we explore famous leaders together in class (For example, Augustus Caesar, Charlemagne, Joan of Arc, Martin Luther, Napoleon, Churchill or Hitler, etc…), students will have the opportunities to explore leaders individually as well.
This course is required for students who transfer into the Honors program or who join without taking the FYEX course. This course provides an orientation to the mission and core competencies of the Honors Program. Students will analyze and categorize leadership, research, and global citizenship themes, identify appropriate learning goals, and develop an e-portfolio for their use in the Honors Program.
This required course for seniors in the program allows the student to articulate where and how he or she has met the Honors Program Learning Outcomes.
Minnesota State
University, Mankato
Mankato, MN 56001
1-800-722-0544
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Minnesota State Colleges & Universities system and an affirmative action/equal opportunity university.
