Schools offer variety of new classes for students
As students prepare to register for classes for the fall semester, they will have the option to select several new courses through each school.
As St. Edward’s University continues to expand, more diverse courses in specialized fields are being offered. Some new majors, minors and tracks have been added as well.
Humanities
In the School of Humanities, a new emphasis for theater majors has been created, Musical Theater. Two new courses for the emphasis, Musical Theater Performance and Audition and Musical Theater Dance, have also been added. New to music department is a Guitar Ensemble course.
A new major, Catholic Studies, will be offered beginning in the fall. Two courses for the major, Catholic Intellectual Life and Catholic Intellectual Heritage, will be offered. In the religious studies department, a course called World Religions in Depth has, too, been added.
Interactive Media Production and Design has been created for journalism students. Richard Bautch, the associate dean of the School of Humanities, said that the course was “designed to give journalism students multimedia training.” A course in copyediting has also been added for journalism.
The School of Humanities has also approved a new major, Interactive Entertainment and Game Design, which Bautch said “will not be implemented until at least next year [in the fall of 2011].”
In addition, a creative writing track for English Literature has been created using existing courses.
Natural Sciences
The School of Natural Sciences has created a new major in their department, Clinical Laboratory Science. The school is also offering two new Advanced Topics in Biology courses: Human Genetics and Human Anatomy and Physiology. In Human Genetics, students will gain a better understanding of “the tools used to locate and analyze genes involved in human disease and therapies derived from that understanding,” according to the course description.
The School of Natural Sciences is also adding an Introduction to Astronomy course, which will satisfy the general education requirement for Science in Depth. In the mathematics department, a special topics course called Mathematical Biology will be offered to students.
Management and
Business
The School of Management and Business has a new undergraduate course for the fall semester, AMA Case Competition. “
Students will collaborate to complete a marketing plan for submission to the American Marketing Association annual business-plan competition,” Dianne Hill, associate dean of the School of Management and Business, said regarding the course.
Several new courses are being offered for the Master of Science in Computing Information Systems graduate program. Four new and significantly revised courses are being offered for the degree—Intellectual Property and Cyberlaw, Business Intelligence with Data Mining, Modern Methods in Software Engineering and Operating Systems.
For the marketing department, two graduate-level courses have been created. Consumerism and Social Responsibility “reviews the marketing practices that are applied at both the individual and societal level,” according to the course description. Marketing Laws and Ethics will examine what is legal, but not always ethical, through in-depth readings, applications, and case analyses.
Garcia and Heiden also said they plan on getting students voices heard through more face-to-face interaction.
Office hours policies require that students go to the SGA office in the Student Life department, located in Ragsdale; however, Heiden said that this time needs to be spent going out and talking to students. Improved Campus Relationships
Kurtzweil and Cook are seeking to improve the relationship between students and administration.
“One of my goals was to try to repair and make that relationship better,” Kurtzweil said.
Heiden said that she and Garcia want to go to the administrative offices and let personnel know that they want to be involved because they have ideas for solutions.
“I want to build mutual respect,” Garcia said. “I want them to know that we can delegate solutions.” Campaign Funding
Another first for this election is the increase in campaign funding. Senate candidates may spend $250, while presidential and vice presidential candidates can spend $500 on their campaigns.
“I don’t have the ability to spend $500 at will,” Garcia said.
Kurtzweil said that she does not think that she will spend anywhere near $500 on the campaign.
“As of right now, I do not know how much we plan to spend,” Kurtzweil. Election Changes
This semester, students will only vote on one vice presidential race. The legislation that SGA passed this semester consolidated the three vice presidential positions into one, and three vice chairs to be appointed by the vice president.
Students will not vote for the individual candidates in the presidential and vice presidential races due to a bill that established a ticket system in which presidential and vice presidential candidates run on a single ticket together.
“I think the ticket system will allow [the president and vice president] to be on the same page,” Kurtzweil said.
Two senators will be elected from each class and one senator from each of the schools.
Sophomore Noah Corn is running for the School of Humanities senator position, junior Karissa Eudy is running for the School of Education senator position and sophomore Payden Johnson is running for School of Natural Sciences senator position.
Junior Eric Bustos is running for the School of Behavior and Social Sciences senator position, and junior Aldaberto Vasquez-Paz is running for senator position for the School of Management and Business.
The two candidates for the senior class senator positions are incumbents Celso Baez III and Mary Michelle “Mimi” Valladarez, and candidates for junior senator position include Brady Faglie and Alexandra Simons.
The two sophomore senator position candidates include Olivia Bouree, Fremen DeRuvo and Andrew Christopher Guerrero.
Also, for the first time since 1999, students may vote for a new SGA Constitution and Student Bill of Rights, which will be available via EdWeb. Voting begins April 5 at 5 p.m. and ends April 12.
For students seeking more information about the candidates, SGA is hosting a “Meet the Candidates” event from 6-7:30 p.m. in the Student Life office, as well as a presidential debate from 7:30-9:30 p.m. in Jones Auditorium. Both events are April 6.
For all the candidates full campaign platforms, see the Hilltop Views Web site at hilltopviewonline.com
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