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Visioning for Excellence

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Visioning for Excellence: Symposium on the Future of Integrative Applied Liberal Arts and Sciences at UB

UB's Yale Gordon College of Arts and Sciences invites you to a five-month symposium to facilitate campuswide conversation about the future of integrative applied liberal arts and sciences at a 21st-century University of Baltimore.

Through presentations from invited thought leaders—who will share their expertise regarding different dimensions of liberal arts and sciences education—and subsequent discussion, the campus community is charged with thinking through the big questions and significant issues related to the state of arts and sciences, all in an effort to help leaders in the College of Arts and Sciences frame an identity and vision for the college.

What sets this symposium and visioning initiative apart is its cross-campus integration. Faculty, staff and student members of all four UB colleges and schools are invited to participate, creating a deeper understanding of liberal arts and sciences education at UB.

Keep up with our progress:

  • Dec. 4, 2012: Carol Geary Schneider, president of the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U), presented to the UB community. Under Schneider's leadership, AAC&U launched Liberal Education and America's Promise, a public-advocacy and campus-action initiative to engage students and the public with what really matters in a college education for the 21st century. The LEAP campaign builds on AAC&U's major effort, Greater Expectations: The Commitment to Quality as a Nation Goes to College, a multiyear initiative designed to articulate the aims of a 21st-century liberal education and to identify comprehensive, innovative models that improve learning for all undergraduate students. View Schneider's presentation and read Schneider's opinion article in The (Baltimore) Sun about her presentation at UB and why "College still matters."
  • March 4, 2013: Richard Guarasci , president of Wagner College in New York City, presented to the UB community. At Wagner, Guarasci founded The Wagner Plan for the Practical Liberal Arts, a comprehensive four-year undergraduate program required of all Wagner students that links interdisciplinary course clusters with experiential learning and civic engagement. The Wagner Plan has been nationally acclaimed by Time Magazine, U.S. News & World Report, Newsweek, The Chronicle of Higher Education and numerous higher education commissions and organizations. Guarasci is now a national leader in higher education with many speaking engagements throughout the United States. View Guarasci's presentation.
  • April 1, 2013: Randy Bass, associate provost, professor and executive director of the Center for New Designs in Learning and Scholarship at Georgetown University, presented to the UB community. Georgetown's campuswide Center for New Designs in Learning and Scholarship supports faculty work in new learning and research environments. Bass has been working at the intersections of new media technologies and the scholarship of teaching and learning for 20 years, including serving as director and principal investigator of the Visible Knowledge Project, a five-year initiative focused on the scholarship of teaching and learning that involved 70 faculty on 21 university and college campuses.
  • May 1, 2013: The Culminating Conversation
    • Ray Allen, vice president for academic affairs and provost, MICA: Allen has led the educational program at MICA through the largest period of growth in its history. Since his appointment in 1994, he has guided the college in the development and addition of 17 new undergraduate and graduate academic programs with comparable growth in faculty, support resources and academic administration. Allen has also led the college in creation of its research initiatives and centers as well as an array of other programmatic opportunities designed to place the skills and expertise of faculty and students in the service of external social, scientific and economic challenges.
    • Jack R. Censer, professor and dean, College of Humanities and Social Sciences, George Mason University: Censer came to George Mason in 1977. He served as the chair of the Department of History & Art History from 1995 to 2006 prior to being named dean of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences. He has held visiting professor appointments at Cornell University and the University of Maryland. His research has examined the French Revolution, intellectual history and the press.
    • Karen Kashmanian Oates, professor and Peterson Family Dean of Arts & Sciences, Worcester Polytechnic Institute: A nationally recognized scientist, science educator and higher education leader, Oates joined the Worcester Polytechnic Institute from the National Science Foundation, where she served as a deputy director of the Division of Undergraduate Studies. She began her academic career at George Mason University, where, as associate dean for the new College of Integrated and Interdisciplinary Studies, she helped create George Mason's New American College environment. She later served as inaugural provost for the Harrisburg University of Science and Technology, where she established the National Center for Science and Civic Engagement and helped secure NSF funds for Science Education for New Civic Engagement and Responsibilities, which works to improve undergraduate STEM education by connecting learning to critical civic questions.