The Education Minor is designed for students who wish to supplement their academic major with studies in the field of education. The Education Minor allows students to explore the intersection of their chosen major and career path with the field of education, without committing to becoming a classroom teacher. The Education Minor provides a deep study into to how political, cultural, social and historical dynamics shape both policy and practice in education, as well as opportunities to focus on particular areas of education as a field of study and practice.

The minor, comprising three credit hours of core coursework and 15 credit hours of electives, is available to all undergraduates. Students are encouraged to meet with an education advisor to help determine which elective courses provide the best opportunities to supplement their specific field of study and/or explore a career path in the field of education.

Requirements

Declaration Process and Minor Requirements

Students may declare the Education Minor at any point in their undergraduate career. To declare the Education Minor, please submit a declaration form online on the School of Education website.

A B (3.00) grade point average must be maintained in education minor coursework (with C- as lowest acceptable course grade) to complete the minor.

Required Courses and Credits

Core Course3
School and Society
Elective Options15
Choose 5 courses from the options below:
Decolonizing Education: Design for New Futures
Energy and Interactions
Designing STEM Learning Environments and Experiences
History of American Public Education
Teaching and Learning Math: Calculus, Trig and Adv Functions
Education in Film
Children's Literature and Literacy Engagement in Elementary Schools
Cultural Diversity and Awareness
Educational Psychology for Elementary Schools
EDUC 2490
Educational Psychology for Elementary Schools
Teaching English Language Development
Renewing Democracy in Communities and Schools
Race, Class, and Gender in Young Adult Literature
Introduction to Teaching and Learning
Learning With Technology In and Out of School
International / Comparative Education
Knowing and Learning in Mathematics and Science
Cultural Mentoring with Dual Language Learners
Adolescent Development and Learning for Teachers
Secondary World Language Methods
Story and Memoir
Language Study for Educators
Language and Literacy across the Curriculum
African American Education in the United States
Queer(ing) Topics in Education
Social and Emotional Learning in Schools
Perspectives on Mathematics
Introduction to Bilingual/Multicultural Education
Teaching and Learning Physics
Language Acquisition for Bilingual Learners
Basic Statistical Methods
Teaching and Learning Biology
Teaching K-12 Mathematics: Number Sense
Teaching K-12 Mathematics: Algebraic Thinking
Teaching K-12 Mathematics: Geometry & Measurement
Teaching K-12 Mathematics: Probability & Statistics
Teaching and Learning Chemistry
Teaching and Learning Earth Systems
Teaching and Learning Computational Thinking
The Chicana and Chicano and U.S. Social Systems
Teaching Design
Social Justice, Leadership and Community Engagement Internships
Facilitating Peaceful Community Change
Total Credit Hours18

Learning Outcomes

The education minor curriculum values and promotes the central role of education for preparing critically/socially engaged and democratically-minded citizens for an increasingly complex, socially diverse, and culturally rich world. The education minor curriculum organizes learning experiences for non-majors that foster, among other things, critical awareness, empathy, flexibility, vulnerability, open-mindedness, imagination, comfort with ambiguity, and an understanding of common experiences, amidst diverse contexts and student histories.

  • Examine the historical, cultural and ideological contexts of public schooling.
  • Explore theories of learning across families, schools, peer groups, communities and cultures.
  • Analyze and explore a self-selected range of topics related to education and connected to major areas of study, for example: roles and meanings of education in a democratic society; justice and equity in education; creativity and agency of youth from non-dominant backgrounds; explorations of popular representations or conventional narratives of students, teachers, and schooling; perspectives on multicultural and bilingual education; perspective on learning mathematics; teaching and reading children’s literature.