IST2039-1OL-FA13 - Mapping the Terrain of Theol.Educ.

Course Description

This course offers an introduction to the critical questions, disciplinary perspectives, and skills needed for initial engagement with graduate theological education.  It serves not only as an introduction to the Iliff curriculum and faculty, but also to broader issues of theories, approaches, and disciplinary boundaries within the field.  This course is designed to be particularly useful for students in their first two terms at Iliff and will use extensive audio interviews with the Iliff Faculty in order to introduce students to the relevant academic profiles of individual faculty members.

Course Objectives

• To introduce students to the historic and contemporary development of theological and religious studies.
• To provide guided opportunities for reflection on connections and disjunctions between various areas of study within theological education.
• To introduce new Iliff students to individual Faculty expertise.
• To enable students to develop a sense of identity and place within Iliff and theological education more broadly.

The assignments in this course are unique to this particular experience in that they are designed to be primarily useful for your own processing and future reference.

Substantial Discussion on Canvas

In this course we will engage in two major online discussions; one around our course readings and the other around the faculty interviews. In order for these conversation spaces to be meaningful learning opportunities, we all need to take responsibility for consistent and substantial participation.

By ‘substantial’ participation we mean that your posts contribute towards two ends; they:

1)     extend the conversation. This is distinct from regurgitating what has already been said and acts to add new or different insight into the strand. This could be a substantial new comment that encompasses several paragraphs or a simple one-line sentence that moves it forward. Just as there are multiple types of contributions made in verbal conversations, there are multiple ways to contribute here as well. It is not helpful for you to be overly verbose or generally absent from the conversation; seek to strike a balance.

2)     ask contextualized questions or make contextualized comments. Your comments and questions should directly and explicitly reference the course materials or prior comments. For instance you might write something like, “one aspect that we haven’t discussed is Brown’s use of ___ on page 16. There he wrote ___ and this problematizes the prior point we were discussing about ___ .” This sort of comment is entirely superior to, “I think that Brown is not helpful to me as youth minister because ___ .”

Detailed Course Notes

Insightful and comprehensive course notes are a foundational tool for graduate education in the liberal arts.  It is essential that you take outstanding notes while listening to the audio presentations, interviews, and course readings.  Essentially these notes form a lasting ‘text’ and I anticipate that you will reference them throughout your time at Iliff.  Please develop your own system for note taking.

Exams

There will be two exams administered electronically in this course.  One is a ‘competency’ exam which tests your basic knowledge of the faculty interviews.  Since there is no clear way for me to ensure that you closely listen (and possibly re-listen) to these audio pieces, I will administer a basic exam over the material.  The questions on this exam will be simple enough that any competent listener should be able to correctly answer while also being difficult enough that one would have a difficult time correctly guessing the answer without having listened.  All course notes, articles, and CVs can be used on this exam.

A second ‘insight’ exam tests advanced knowledge of these same materials.  This exam seeks to assess your level of understanding and integration of the course materials.  While I will not test you on the minutia of minor points from the interviews or readings, I will ask more sophisticated questions about the material.  All course notes, articles, and CVs can be used on this exam.  I will explain more regarding the ‘why’ of these exams in the ‘Introductory Audio’ piece.

Relevancy Paper

The final relevancy paper is directly related to faculty readings that you select.  You will select two faculty members and track down for each an article-length (book chapters, published article, etc) writing your choosing.  For additional assistance with securing these readings please contact Mary Olson in Iliff’s Taylor Library with questions (molson@iliff.edu – 303-765-3170).  This paper should be 5-8 pages and be a good representation of both your interests and insight.  For further questions please use the Q&A on Canvas.

This course is offered for letter grade.  The following is the general rubric that will be used:

• Timeliness and professionalism in completing all assignments:  10%
• Substantial Canvas Discussion: 20%
• Competency exam:  10%
• Insight exam:  20%
• Relevancy paper:  40%

I will discuss grading more thoroughly in the ‘Introduction to (Online) Journey Mapping’ audio piece.

Good student-instructor communication is important in any learning endeavor.  Since this course is fully online, I expect you to post questions to the discussion board on Canvas or email me directly.  The deadlines posted on the schedule are rigid and few exceptions will be granted.

Incompletes are strongly discouraged but may be granted for extreme circumstances.  Please submit your request for an incomplete to me via email as early as possible.  Some examples of possible reasons for incompletes include:  deaths in the family and hospitalization.

All required readings will be posted to Canvas. You may want to purchase a theological dictionary to enable rapid translation of difficult terms within the reading and during class.  Some suggested dictionaries include:

Justo L. Gonzalez – Essential Theological Terms (Westminster)
Van A. Harvey – A Handbook of Theological Terms (Touchstone)
Donald K. McKim – Westminster Dictionary of Theological Terms (Westminster)

Accommodation

Iliff engages in a collaborative effort with students who have disabilities to reasonably accommodate their needs in order to support effective learning.  Students are encouraged to contact their assigned advisor to initiate the process of requesting accommodations.  The Advising Center may be contacted as advising@iliff.edu, or by phone at 303.765.1146.