Perspective-Taking, Learning, Social Responsibility: What the Research Reveals

Chad Anderson, Program Associate, Office of Diversity, Equity, and Global Initiatives; Caryn McTighe Musil, Senior Vice President for Diversity, Equity, and Global Initiatives; and Nancy O’Neill, Director of Integrative Programs and the LEAP Campus Action Network—all of AAC&U

October 22, 2010

AAC&U Network for Academic Renewal Conference, Facing the Divides: Diversity, Learning, and Pathways to Inclusive Excellence

Session Goals Highlight AAC&U’s national initiative, Core

Commitments: Educating Students for Personal and Social Responsibility;

Share data on perspective-taking gleaned from national/multi-institutional studies;

Offer examples of promising campus practices designed to enhance perspective-taking;

Lift up promising practices from participants’ institutions;

Draft brief action plans for enhancing, scaling up, and/or assessing perspective-taking to take back to campus.

I. Overview of Core

Commitments: Educating

Students for Personal and

Social Responsibility

The LEAP Essential Learning OutcomesBeginning in school, and continuing at successively

higher levels across their college studies, students should prepare for twenty-first-century challenges by gaining:

Knowledge of human cultures and the physical and natural world

Intellectual and practical skills Personal and social responsibility Integrative learning

Five Dimensions of Personal and Social

Responsibility1. Striving for excellence: developing a strong work ethic and

consciously doing one’s very best in all aspects of college;

2. Cultivating personal and academic integrity: recognizing and acting on a sense of honor, ranging from honesty in relationships to principled engagement with a formal academic honors code;

3. Contributing to a larger community: recognizing and acting on one’s responsibility to the educational community and the wider society, locally, nationally, and globally;

4. Taking seriously the perspectives of others: recognizing and acting on the obligation to inform one’s own judgment; engaging diverse and competing perspectives as a resource for learning, citizenship, and work;

5. Developing competence in ethical and moral reasoning and action: developing ethical and moral reasoning in ways that incorporate the other four responsibilities; using such reasoning in learning and in life. 

Interrelated Strands of Work Leadership consortium Research and assessment Presidential “Call to Action” Amplifying activities with other

campuses and the public Weaving in new related initiatives Generation of resources

Personal and Social Responsibility Inventory (PSRI) Campus climate instrument

Surveys four constituent groups – students, faculty, academic administrators, and student affairs professionals – across the five dimensions of PSR

Gauges perceptions about opportunities for education for PSR across the institution – gives insight into institutional pervasiveness

Administered at 23 Leadership Consortium institutions in fall 2007

II. Selected data points related to

Perspective-Taking

PSRI: “Should” vs. “Is”A gap exists between the aspiration and the actuality of the goal of helping students to take seriously the perspectives of others on campus.

Source: Engaging Diverse Viewpoints: What Is the Campus Climate for Perspective-Taking? (2010)

PSRI: Perceptions of Student Behaviors

Source: Engaging Diverse Viewpoints: What Is the Campus Climate for Perspective-Taking? (2010)

PSRI: Advocacy for Perspective-Taking

Source: Engaging Diverse Viewpoints: What Is the Campus Climate for Perspective-Taking? (2010)

PSRI: Enhancing Activities

Participation in community service is associated with student perceptions that the college experience promotes awareness of different perspectives.

Source: Engaging Diverse Viewpoints: What Is the Campus Climate for Perspective-Taking? (2010)

PSRI: Enhancing Activities

Source: Engaging Diverse Viewpoints: What Is the Campus Climate for Perspective-Taking? (2010)

Interacting with faculty outside of class is associated with students’ beliefs that the college experience promotes awareness of different perspectives.

HERI: Enhancing Activities

Source: Higher Education Research Institute (HERI), UCLA (2009)

When students interact frequently and meaningfully with peers of different racial/ethnic backgrounds than their own, they show greater likelihood of growth in pluralistic orientation, civic awareness, social agency, and habits of mind for lifelong learning.

HERI data also indicate that interactions with diverse

peers can occur over general intellectual issues as well as over “diversity issues” (such as meaningful discussions about race/ethnicity). This indicates (a) a general benefit in having racially and ethnically diverse students engage in meaningful interactions and (b) a specific benefit in having racially and ethnically diverse students engage in meaningful interactions around diversity issues.

HERI: Enhancing Activities

Source: Higher Education Research Institute (HERI), UCLA (2009), n=26,758

YFCY Scores on Pluralistic Orientation

Total

High Score

Average Score Low Score

Your First College Year Survey Item: Had intellectual discussions outside of class with students from a racial/ethnic group other than my own

Very Often51.9% 36.1% 12.0% 100.0%

Often30.8% 48.7% 20.5% 100.0%

Sometimes23.3% 46.2% 30.5% 100.0%

Seldom17.1% 45.2% 37.7% 100.0%

Never16.8% 37.9% 45.3 % 100%

Total26.7% 43.8% 29.5% 100.0%

NSSE: Frequency of Activities

Source: National Survey of Student Engagement (2009) – frequency distributions by Carnegie Classification

In your experience at your institution during the current school year, about how often have you:

First Year Students

Seniors

Included diverse perspectives (different races, religions, genders, political beliefs, etc.) in class discussions or writing assignments? (FY n=159,175; SR n=174,523)

Very Often 24% 28%Often 38% 34%Sometimes 31% 30%Never 7% 8%

Had serious conversations with students of a different race or ethnicity than your own? (FY n=149,711; SR n=168,841)

Very Often 25% 27%Often 27% 28%Sometimes 32% 33%Never 15% 12%

Had serious conversations with students who are very different from you in terms of their religious beliefs, political opinions, or personal values? (FY n=149,826; SR n=168,899)

Very Often 27% 28%Often 29% 30%Sometimes 32% 33%Never 11% 10%

NSSE: Frequency of Activities

Source: National Survey of Student Engagement (2009) - senior grand frequencies by major

“In your experience at your institution during the current school year…how often have you included diverse perspectives (different races, religions, genders, political beliefs, etc.) in class discussions or writing assignments?” (n=157,061)

NSSE: Frequency of Activities

Source: National Survey of Student Engagement (2009) - senior grand frequencies by major

“During the current school year…how often have you tried to better understand someone else’s view by imagining how an issue looks from his or her perspective?” (n= 157,269)

III. Sample Promising Practices

Promising PracticesExample 1: Arcadia University’s “Global

Connections Experience” requirement

Students must study abroad, study away, or enroll in long-term, cross-cultural experience locally.

Students reflect about their experiences, connecting theory and practice, leading them to deeply consider differing perspectives.

PSR issues are pervasive across the curriculum, interdisciplinary, integrative learning, and experiential learning accessible to all students.

Source: http://www.aacu.org/core_commitments/PromisingPractices.cfm

Promising PracticesExample 2: Sacred Heart University’s

“Common Core: The Human Journey” program

The structure of core curriculum around “central, enduring” questions invites differing viewpoints from students and faculty across disciplines.

Focus on large, global, complex questions creates cohesive yet interdisciplinary core curriculum.

“Common Core” is interdisciplinary and institutionally pervasive.

Source: http://www.aacu.org/core_commitments/PromisingPractices.cfm

Promising PracticesExample 3: United States Air Force Academy,

“Respect for Human Dignity” Outcome

Outcome communicates to students that institution advocates for engaging diverse viewpoints.

USAFA used previously established learning outcomes and institutional strengths to infuse the new outcomes into all four years.

Collaboration across disciplines and offices to achieve goals.

Outcome is woven throughout core curriculum and both military and academic programs.

Source: http://www.aacu.org/core_commitments/leadershipconsortium.cfm

Table Discussion

Describe three or four of your institution’s most effective specific curricular or co-curricular strategies/programs that are designed to encourage students to take seriously the perspectives of others as a resource for learning and for life? (Create collective list.)

Where do these activities “sit” in your institution? (E.g., in specific academic departments, in student affairs, etc.)

Enhancing Opportunities Do students view these activities as central to the

learning experience or disconnected from it? (Think about how campus leaders might strengthen the connection between perspective-taking and your institution’s core academic mission?)

What percentage of the student body participates in these activities? (What might campus leaders do to scale up these activities?)

What evidence exists that students’ perspective-taking is enhanced by these activities?

(What might campus leaders do to begin to assess or improve perspective-taking?)

Resources

For more information on the Core Commitments initiative, including examples of promising practices, tools, and publications, visit www.aacu.org/Core_Commitments

To submit promising practices for possible inclusion in the Core Commitments resource bank, email Chad Anderson at anderson@aacu.org

To contact Nancy O’Neill or Caryn McTighe Musil, email oneill@aacu.org or musil@aacu.org