Institutional Diversity and Inclusion
Website: uca.edu/diversity
Contact: Angela Webster, awebster@uca.edu
UCA’s Office of Institutional Diversity and Inclusion has a mission to attract and support a diverse student, faculty and staff population and provide enhanced multicultural learning opportunities. UCA values the opportunity to work, learn, and develop in a community that embraces the diversity of individuals and ideas, including race, ethnicity, religion, spiritual beliefs, national origin, age, gender, marital status, socioeconomic background, sexual orientation, physical ability, political affiliation, and intellectual perspective.
UCA students can apply for leadership roles in co-curricular programs such as BMAC (Black Male Achievement Challenge), the Latino Student Association, the Minority Mentorship Program, Project X, Students for the Propagation of Black Culture, and Women of Excellence.
Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL)
Website: uca.edu/global-learning/coil/
Contact: Phillip Bailey, phillipb@uca.edu
Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) connects students and professors in different countries for collaborative projects and discussions as part of their coursework. COIL Collaborations between students and professors provide meaningful, significant opportunities for global experiences built into programs of study. COIL enhances intercultural student team focused interaction through proven approaches to meaningful online and virtual engagement, while providing universities with a cost-effective way to ensure that their students are globally engaged. In order to provide more UCA students access to collaborating with international students around the world, UCA joined the COIL Global Network in 2021 to provide UCA faculty with opportunities to adopt powerful COIL methods in their classes.
Education Abroad
Website: uca.edu/globalstudy
Contact: Alexandra Depner, adepner1@uca.edu
UCA students can participate in global learning first-hand through education abroad experiences. Education abroad at UCA includes a number of arrangements by which students complete part of their degree program through educational activities outside the United States. Such activities may include international classroom study, research, internships, and/or service-learning for academic credit. Three main types of education abroad programs are offered through UCA are language immersion, faculty-led study abroad programs, and semester exchange.
Students may also choose to study away through National Student Exchange (NSE). NSE offers UCA students an opportunity to study away through member colleges and universities throughout the United States, Canada, Guam, Puerto Rico, and U.S Virgin Islands. Students apply for admission through NSE and upon acceptance enroll in classes representing their UCA major or minor.
UCA Core
Website: uca.edu/core
Contact: Jacob Held, jmheld@uca.edu
UCA’s Core curriculum includes diversity as defined by the ability to analyze familiar cultural assumptions in the context of the world’s diverse values, traditions, and belief systems as well as to analyze the major ideas, techniques, and processes that inform creative works within different cultural and historical contexts.
At the lower-division, courses dedicated to Diversity (understanding and appreciating one’s own culture, other cultures, and the way in which they influence and are influenced by creative expressions and the fine arts), expose students to and provide opportunities to engage with and develop a basic understanding and appreciation of one’s own culture, other cultures and their interrelatedness, or how these ideas and perspectives are reflected in humanity’s creative output. Courses in this area don’t simply recognize diversity in fact, but are about educating students about a critical engagement and appreciation of diverse cultures and values. This development requires the introduction of fundamental skills and concepts, repeated exposure, and frequent opportunities for feedback.