Beginning Fall 2013, the Honors College will be offering Honors 380: Trends Shaping Our Future. Unlike conventional courses, Honors 380 will offer students the unique opportunity to study our society 30-50 years in the future. The course is open to students of all majors who are in the Honors College or have a GPA of 3.2 or higher, and have completed 24 hours. It can count as upper division or colloquia credit, depending on the student’s preferences.
Professor Nathan Phelps, the course’s instructor, stresses that students from all fields of study will find something worthwhile and relevant to their careers in the course, and hopes that Trends Shaping our Future will encourage students to “think broadly about issues that will shape our world.”
The course draws from The Center for Strategic and International Studies and their “7 Revolutions” – the aspects of the world, which they predict, are most likely to be revolutionarily different in the near future. The seven areas are: population; resource management and environmental stewardship; technological innovation and diffusion; the development and dissemination of information and knowledge; economic integration; the nature and mode of conflict; and the challenge of governance.
The Americans Association of Colleges and Universities has worked to develop this concept into collegiate course work. There will be two Honors 380: Trends Shaping our Future courses available Fall 2013. Anyone seeking further information is welcome to email Professor Phelps at Nathan.phelps@wku.edu.
(Source: WKU Honors College to offer exciting new colloquia, Arete contribution submitted by Callie Mobley, Honors Headlines, Apr 3, 2013)