Spring class additions offer new opportunities

New classes have been added to the GCSU curriculum this semester in hopes of encouraging student interest. Two of these new classes – a model U.N. class and a course about modern Eastern Europe – focus on the world today.

According to the GCSU Web site, the college encourages professors to add new classes.

“Our flexible curriculum allows professors to create new courses reflecting their areas of interest and expertise,” the Web site states.

According to the GCSU registrar’s office, departments add new classes on a need-to basis.

Dr. Roger Coate, who teaches the Model U.N. course, said he found it easy to add the class.

“There were no problems adding the course because Dr. Steve Elliott-Gower took it as overload. No one was going to say no to a free course,” said Coate.

Coate is the Paul Covxerdell Professor of Policy and an internationally known expert on the United Nations.

Elliott-Gower, who is also teaching the class, said that the course was offered due to student interest.

“It was specifically, as a result of a series of conversations between myself and student Paul Danaj,” Elliott-Gower said.

Danaj, a junior international economics major, also minoring in Spanish, is president of the Model U.N. Club.

“Since the meeting time of the club is at night it was hard for many of the members to come. Making it a class may serve to get people more interested,” Danaj said.

The class is divided into two separate parts. One day, usually Thursdays, the class goes over the basic foundation of the U.N. as well as its history. They also explore the scope of the organization. The other day that the class meets, Tuesdays, students simulate what it is like to be a member of the U.N. There is also a practicum to prepare the members for the conferences that the club attends.

The class is different from regular meetings of the Model U.N. Club because it includes the expertise of the professors teaching it.

“I obviously have limited experience with the U.N. and the teachers have much more. We get to learn from them,” Danaj said.

One day Danaj wants to work for the U.N. and the class brings people with similar interests and goals together.

There are also numerous upper-level courses on special topics offered. They change from time to time.

The one that has been added for this semester is a class on Modern Eastern Europe. Dr. William Risch, the professor of the course, added it through the department chair. There is also a graduate version of the class.

“I hope to make this course a permanent part of our department’s curriculum,” Risch said.

The class briefly goes over the history of Eastern Europe and the area’s not-so-distant struggles with Communism. It also concentrates on the area, as it exists today.

Posted by Danielle Paluga on Jan 22 2010. Filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry