Minority Learning and Campus Culture: The Rider University Educational Opportunity Program

By:
Dr. John Hulsman
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It is well understood after several decades of attempts to integrate the needs of minority students and mainstream students on predominately white college campuses that simply supplementing the curriculum with minority studies and scheduling minority cultural events is often at best a half-way measure and at worst an approach that isolates the very groups one wishes to incorporate into the cultural life of the university. As one way of institutionalizing diversity, The Rider University Educational Opportunity Program, using state-funded scholarships for a group of mostly minority 'at risk' students, has developed over the years a vigorous and sustainable merger of minority and broader campus academic interests. EOP freshmen are formed into a learning community that studies and writes about both canonical works in the humanities and important minority writing. This culminates each year in the sponsorship of a well-attended major campus cultural event built around a visiting writer. My paper will describe this program and treat issues of curriculum, leadership, and sustainability related to it.


Keywords: Minority Studies, Diversity, Learning Community, Curriculum, Leadership, Sustainability
Stream: Curriculum and Pedagogy, Student Learning, Learner Experiences, Learner Diversity, Educational Leadership and Management
Presentation Type: 30 minute Paper Presentation in English
Paper: A paper has not yet been submitted.

Dr. John Hulsman

Professor of English, English Department, Rider University
USA

I am Professor of English Literature at Rider University in Lawrenceville, New Jersey, specializing in nineteenth century British literature. I am a contributing editor to the Ohio University Complete Works of Robert Browning, and my anthology of writings by John Henry Newman, The Rule of Our Warfare, was published in 2002. I have written on Charles Dickens and cultural relations between England and America in the Victorian era. My other interests are post-colonial studies and the education of minority students, subjects on which I have written a variety of papers. For many years, I have taught a course in humanities and writing for New Jersey inner-city students as part of the Rider Educational Opportunity Program and for the past decade directed the campus Distinguished Writers Series for visiting minority writers.

Ref: L06P0086