UNIV 299: What's the Big Idea?
The UNIV 299 courses meet VCU ConnectED/GenEd requirement for Breadth of Knowledge
Each section of UNIV 299 focuses on an interdisciplinary "big question" that has intrigued thinkers throughout time and across cultures. As students move from personal to global — and from theoretical to practical — investigations of the question, they will come to understand inquiry as a complex cycle of questioning, gathering, examining, interpreting, comparing, analyzing and evaluating, with important application to decision-making and problem-solving in the real world.
See below for active UNIV 299 Courses
UNIV 299: Spring 2025
What's the Big Idea about Environmental Justice? (Service Learning)
Professor Beth Kreydatus
CRN 42961| Hybrid-Asynchronous
The Environmental Protection Agency defines environmental justice, or "EJ," as the "fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income, with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies." Virginia has long been home to an active and diverse environmental justice movement, as EJ advocates have worked to ensure that state and local policies are truly just. In this course, we'll explore some of the issues local activists have addressed, such as concerns about energy costs for low-income households, the impacts of construction of new fossil fuel infrastructure, the siting of landfills and other toxic projects in minority or working-class neighborhoods, the distribution of green energy jobs and resources, and concerns about the transparency of the environmental regulatory process. In this project-based course, students will first learn about EJ issues, and then they will pursue research that serves a local environmental justice organization. Over the course of the semester, students will complete 20 hours of service to a local organization, gaining first-hand experience and community connections, while developing and completing a research based-project that serves that community partner.
What's the Big Idea about the Future of Work?
Professor Virginia Totaro
CRN 47883, Face-to-Face
Research shows that over our lifetimes, we will spend more time working than on any other activity, aside from sleeping. But how often do we stop to really think about “work” as an area to study? In this seminar, students will explore the history, current challenges, and expectations for the workforce of the future. How did the Industrial Revolution upend gender roles in the US? Why are most jobs today in the service sector? How can entrepreneurial thinking impact your future? Will AI transform your job prospects? The final project will lead students through a process of investigating a work-related industry, job, or problem to help them develop a real-world understanding of how to achieve their goals or work towards solving challenges of the future. This section of UNIV 299 will use readings, films, and guest speakers to create an engaging, thought-provoking, and relevant course of study.
What's the Big Idea about a "Good" Death?
Professor Amy Tudor
CRN 46257, Online Asynchronous
How does a house become haunted? Why do we embalm our dead when many other cultures do not, and what is a green burial? What do we mean when we discuss “quality of life” or talk about a “good death,” and do we know anything about what happens after death? If you’ve ever expressed an interest in subjects like these, you may have been dissuaded from studying or even talking about them because they’re “morbid” or “depressing.” Not so! True, many people find issues around death and dying difficult, but being able to openly discuss them is both personally and culturally important. In this class we’ll answer these and many more questions about death and dying, and we’ll explore the concept of legacy by completing community-based Life Story Projects with local seniors. Join Dr. Amy Tudor, a thanatologist and certified Death Doula, for this in-depth but surprisingly light-hearted look at death and dying in history, art, folklore, and contemporary culture.
What's the Big Idea about Sustainable Design?
Professor Matthew Vechinski
CRN 48807, Hybrid Asynchronous
The Big Idea for this section is sustainable design, a concept combining the interdisciplinary study of sustainability with the practice of design thinking common today in many arenas. It will take a broad approach to sustainability in line with UCLA’s definition focusing on thriving, resilient communities resulting from attention to intersecting concerns about the environment, the economy, and equity (i.e, “the three Es”). The course will explore what it takes to design for sustainability by drawing on methods of human-centered design thinking, design activism, and social entrepreneurship. It aims to give students the tools to identify opportunities for problem solving and innovation through empathy, research, and prototyping. The course will explore a variety of questions that map onto stages in the sustainable design process and mirror the typical steps in the research process. What sustainability goals should we pursue to improve our communities, given their assets and needs? How do we create the conditions for cooperative efforts at sustainability despite inequities and imbalances of power? How do we measure and communicate our progress toward achieving sustainability goals?
UNIV 299: Intersession 2025
What's the Big Idea About Misinformation?
Professor Alli Tharp
CRN 46867, Online asynchronous
In 2016, Oxford English Dictionary declared "post-truth" their word of the year, referring to how we are so much more convinced by emotional appeals than factual ones. But is this a new phenomenon, or is this tendency somehow inherent to us? In this class, we will delve into the psychological basis for why people are drawn to conspiratorial thinking, pseudoscience, and misinformation, and we'll probe the effects of this thinking on the broader public. We'll debunk the stereotype that people who fall for misinformation are uneducated and isolated, instead recognizing the ways in which any of us, me and you included, can be conned into believing the unbelievable in order to sustain psychological well-being. This course will center critical thinking and analytical writing to start to make sense of the insensible, and in the process, to develop a level of understanding and empathy for why logic and reason seem to have taken a back seat to personal truth in our current techno-political climate.
What's the Big Idea about the Culture of Complexion?
Professor Kiara Lee
CRN 48987, Online asynchronous
Where do our thoughts and biases about skin complexion come from? How do we digest mainstream culture and its perpetuation of colorism, discrimination where one's value is based on the shade of their skin? In what ways are seemingly different facets of complexion, like skin bleaching and sun tanning, so wildly different, yet, similar? Can the power that comes with complexion, something that is out of our own control, ever be taken away? Students will investigate these questions and more with local, global and racialized lenses while making sense of the culture of complexion in their own lives and in their own skin.
What's the Big Idea About Food?
Professor Joseph Cates
CRN 48815, Online asynchronous
Food is universal; all humans need to eat. Food is not just fuel for the body; humanity’s search for and relationship with food have shaped the course of history. For example, we define historical development using changes in food as a marker of civilization (hunter/gatherers vs. agricultural societies), integrate food into religious rituals (communion), use food to mark rites of passage (wedding cake), and eat in historically and culturally specific ways – not to mention that cooking is often considered a creative art, and that the arts often incorporate and emphasize food. Even so, food is fuel for the body – and our food supplies and sources often serve to inscribe significant economic and political boundaries. This course will examine food from a variety of disciplines. Using analytical lenses from sociology, anthropology, philosophy, art, literature, history, political science, psychology, economics and religious studies, students will explore:
- the cultural, historical, sociological, economic, psychological, spiritual, and political dimensions of food;
- how food shapes national, regional, gender, ethnic, racial, class, religious, and personal identity;
- how the media and industry affect the food we eat;
- food as a venue for creative and personal expression;
- the production, consumption, and distribution of food;
- food as a source of conflict: global food and agricultural problems and food-related social problems, including food security and scarcity, food and agricultural situations in developing nations, the impact of globalized, industrialized agriculture on local communities, farmers, consumers and the environment.
Food for Thought (UNIV 211)
This course is frequently offered both as a Service-Learning Course and a non-Service-Learning course. No prerequisites.
Food is universal; all humans need to eat. Food is not just fuel for the body; humanity’s search for and relationship with food have shaped the course of history. For example, we define historical development using changes in food as a marker of civilization (hunter/gatherers vs. agricultural societies), integrate food into religious rituals (communion), use food to mark rites of passage (wedding cake), and eat in historically and culturally specific ways – not to mention that cooking is often considered a creative art, and that the arts often incorporate and emphasize food. Even so, food is fuel for the body – and our food supplies and sources often serve to inscribe significant economic and political boundaries. This course will examine food from a variety of disciplines. Using analytical lenses from sociology, anthropology, philosophy, art, literature, history, political science, psychology, economics and religious studies, students will explore:
- the cultural, historical, sociological, economic, psychological, spiritual, and political dimensions of food;
- how food shapes national, regional, gender, ethnic, racial, class, religious, and personal identity;
- how the media and industry affect the food we eat;
- food as a venue for creative and personal expression;
- the production, consumption, and distribution of food;
- food as a source of conflict: global food and agricultural problems and food-related social problems, including food security and scarcity, food and agricultural situations in developing nations, the impact of globalized, industrialized agriculture on local communities, farmers, consumers and the environment.
No prerequisites.
Primarily, this course will explore the function and nature of lying in different situations (education, art, journalism, politics, advertising, interpersonal relationships, etc.) and, in so doing, will attempt to distinguish between types of lies given form and context. At the same time, we will consider the ethical implications of lying, how we may go about understanding and detecting lies in various real-world settings, and how lying shapes perceptions of character.
Some core questions:
What is a lie?
- Are there various types of lies? If so, what are they?/li>
- How should we judge acts of lying? Is it ever right? When would we know?
- How do our particular ideologies influence how we find and assess information
- How do ways in which we communicate shape the way information is understood?
- What role do audiences play when lying?
- Can we identify verbal and non-verbal signals when someone is being dishonest?
Prerequisites: UNIV 111 and 112 or both ENGL 295 and HONR 200. Often offered as Service-Learning course.
In this course, you will examine the strategies available in contemporary society for personal expression. We will explore what it means to have a “voice,” how to have a voice, and how to ensure that your expression is decoded and understood by your intended audience. Practical application will be explored through understanding cultural, textural and civic expression. We will examine trends in communicating ideas and values through a range of strategies such as music, fashion, advertising, consumer choice, visual media and technology. You will pursue projects based on your own interests in order to demonstrate and develop your influence on the world around you. In a sense, this is a course in the messages that are conveyed in our society, and how people decode and understand those messages.
The core competencies addressed in this Tier II course are: Information Fluency, Critical Thinking, and Ethical/Civic Responsibility.
The course curriculum will prepare students to:
- Assess the cogency of arguments, and construct her/his own argument
- Think reflectively about modes of expression (their own and those of others)
- Synthesize various source material in order to solve problems and find their own voice within a range of multidisciplinary perspectives
- Engage in problem-based learning, requiring them to apply their critical thinking skills to determine the best solution or course of action in a given context, rather than adhering to a single standard approach.
- Collect, evaluate and present information effectively and efficiently 6. Use information ethically and legally /li>
- Decode and construct cultural messages
- Critically review actions in response to global/local issues
- Expand their ability to collaborate with others and appreciation for the benefits of group work (through a group project designed to integrate different forms of expression within a targeted campaign for change)
The course is divided up into three units which address various avenues of personal expression. The units are:
- Textual Expression (Digital, Visual, and Rhetorical strategies)
- Cultural Expression (Music, Art, Fashion, Food, etc.)
- Civic Expression (Volunteerism, Consumerism, Education, Political Activism, etc.)
While there is clearly overlap from one form of expression to the next, we will try to explore these various modes of expression separately in order to determine which responses work best for addressing particular issues/problems in our society. We will explore both practical and theoretical considerations of these strategies in order to facilitate this process.
No prerequisites.
Without sharp critical thinking skills, people are more vulnerable to exploitation based on misrepresentations of nature and scientific knowledge. Even in our age of unprecedented scientific and technological progress, many of us are still swayed by superstitions, biases, and flights of fancy. All too often, such ideas are covered with a veneer of scientific legitimacy and made more enticing. Thankfully, the critical study of pseudoscience can help to remedy this. Pseudoscience is an interdisciplinary course that explores the controversial fringes of inquiry. It will engage a variety of subjects, including astronomy, anthropology, biology, mathematics, medicine, philosophy, and psychology, and bring them into conversation with one another. Central to the course is the application of critical thinking skills to a variety of “strange ideas.”
Course Goals:
- This course will afford a deeper understanding of the nature of science and rational modes of inquiry and what separates them from pseudoscience and other irrational pursuits.
- We will develop and apply advanced critical thinking skills in the evaluation of pseudoscientific claims and methods. The curriculum will emphasize the analysis and assessment of controversial positions. Through an extensive study of the varieties of cognitive biases and fallacious reasoning, we can assess the deficiencies of pseudoscientific inquiry more precisely.
- We will gain a greater understanding of how superstitions, poor decisions, and dubious beliefs arise from common cognitive processes
- The course addresses a number of foundational inquiry questions, including:
- What is the nature of scientific knowledge?
- What distinguishes good science from bad science, and science from pseudoscience?
- What makes fringe ideas so compelling to so many people?
- What is skepticism, and why should one be skeptical?
- This course seeks to advance quantitative literacy by devoting special attention to the uses and misuses of data to support or refute controversial claims and mathematical fallacies underlying weak quantitative reasoning.
- Finally, the course aims to promote skill in oral communication, one of the competencies in VCU’s Core Curriculum. The course will encourage active discussion and diligent preparation for formal presentations.