The Diversity, Power, Agency task force (DPA) has been asked to review the Multicultural Requirement (MCR) and make recommendations for updates/revisions. The following are excerpts from the task force’s conversations thus far. This project is ongoing and feedback is encouraged.
Multicultural Requirement (MCR) Renewal at a Glance
See also, Joint Committee Report
The University of Oregon requires two “multicultural” courses for a baccalaureate degree. Students must select courses from two of three categories:
American Cultures
Courses study race and ethnicity in the United States from a historical and comparative perspective.
~179 courses; 14 percent of UO’s MCR
Identity, Pluralism, and Tolerance
Courses explore how group identities are formed based on ethnicity, class, gender, disability, religion, sexual orientation, or other characteristics
~362 courses; 30 percent of UO’s MCR
International Cultures
Courses examine world cultures either by focusing on how they create group identities and approach tolerance or by analyzing a particular culture that differs significantly from more familiar cultures in contemporary America. Can be fulfilled by study abroad.
~678 courses; 56 of UO’s MCR.[1]
[1] Statistics from “Joint Committee: Review of the Multicultural Requirement,” April 21, 2016
MCR History
The current MCR was passed in 1994 replacing the prior single course “race, gender, and non-European-American” requirement, which itself had only been established in the late 1980s. The push for a new MCR was initiated by student advocacy and the sense that conditions the United States and world urgently required UO students to think more critically about race and diversity. A motion to boost the requirement to two courses—one focusing on race relations in the United States and theorizing racial categories, a second course addressing identity and diversity more broadly, focusing on “how gender, race, ethnicity and/or class shape experience or identity, relations among social groups, or the creative expressions of women, peoples of color, ethnic minorities and/or non-European cultures” passed the Senate with strong support, but met resistance in the University Assembly—the “debate…was characterized as the most contentious since the Vietnam War era.” The Assembly sent the matter back to committee, which drew up our current categories as a compromise.
To read more: http://pages.uoregon.edu/uosenate/dirsen023/MultiCult.html
Recommendations Updates/Revisions
coming soon…