BC Experience
 

Brevard Common Experience

The Brevard College general education curriculum provides a comprehensive liberal arts foundation that grounds students in effective communication skills, critical thinking ability, and a sense of personal and global responsibility.  Believing education to be a trust, the faculty invite students into meaningful interaction through collective academic experiences, interdisciplinary dialogue, and the acquisition of essential skills and knowledge. 

As a means to meet this mission, Brevard College has developed an innovative two-tiered general education program consisting of common experience courses and distribution requirements.

The Brevard College Common Experience Courses create an exceptional opportunity for students to connect with their cohort and to experience the value of an interdisciplinary approach.  The “BC Experience” course requirements are:

I.   BCE 111 – “Perspectives” 3 semester hours

II.  BCE 210 – “Environmental Perspectives”  4 semester hours
An interdisciplinary study of the past, present, and future of forest an driver ecosystems, this course looks at ecology and natural history, effects of human activities, and environmental economics, ethics, and policy.  Lectures, panel discussions, laboratory exercises, and field trips are offered. 

III. BCE LINC – Learning IN Community (LINC) 6 semester hours
To meet this requirement, students enroll simultaneously in two courses from different academic disciplines (English, Communications, Philosophy, History, and Religion, for example) that are connected by a predetermined College-wide theme (“Global Citizenship” in 2007-2008).  Students participating in LINC also attend campus events related to the theme.

The primary goals of intertwining the two courses with each other and with campus events are to (1) engage students in community learning and cross-disciplinary analysis, (2) foster students’ abilities to apply humanistic studies and analysis to significant current issues, and (3) create a shared intellectual culture related to humanistic studies at the College

Examples of LINC courses previous offered:

  • New Testament Studies & Anthropolgy
  • Ethics & Literature
  • African-American Literature & African-American History
  • Environmental Theology & Environmental Literature
  • American Christianity & US History
  • Western Civilization & Western Music
  • Mass Media and Mass Com & First Amendment

IV. BCE 410 – Senior Capstone    3 semester hours
The Senior Capstone is a course developed as the culminating experience of the General Education Curriculum.  It is designed as an interdisciplinary exploration of the complexity and application of leadership.  Students examine the differing ways in which people learn, relate, and collaborate in their occupations and personal lives; honor and weigh various strategies in reasoning and ethics; appreciate diversity; and demonstrate citizenship by serving others within Brevard College and the wider community.