Complex Problems & Enduring Questions
First year students are invited to enroll in Boston College’s innovative, team-taught Core courses: Complex Problem and Enduring Question. Each one is collaboratively taught by two faculty members from different academic departments, and each is designed to engage students in interdisciplinary explorations of topics of critical importance. These include areas such as ethics and engineering; race and violence; markets, cultures, and values; economics, law, and health policy; the value of freedom; psychological and literary perspectives of disability; and more.
Complex Problem and Enduring Question courses extend inquiry beyond the classroom to labs, reflection sessions, conversations with outside speakers, and off-campus field visits, creating an intensive shared learning experience for both teachers and students. They exemplify Boston College’s innovative approach to Core education by establishing a foundation for students’ intellectual development and preparing them to become engaged, effective world citizens.
You will have the opportunity to enroll in Complex Problem and Enduring Question courses when you register for spring courses this November. Both are worth six credits and fulfill two of the University’s Core Curriculum requirements.
| Subject | Representative | |
|---|---|---|
| AADS | Lorelle Semley | lorelle.semley@bc.edu |
| AAHF - Art History | Aurelia Campbell | aurelia.campbell@bc.edu |
| AAHF - Film | John Michalczyk | john.michalczyk@bc.edu |
| AAHF - Studio Art | Mark Cooper | mark.cooper@bc.edu |
| Biology | Kathleen Dunn | kathy.dunn@bc.edu |
| Biology | Rebecca Dunn | rebecca.dunn@bc.edu |
| Chemistry | Lynne O’Connell | lynne.oconnell@bc.edu |
| Classics | Kendra Eshleman | kendra.eshleman@bc.edu |
| Communication | Lindsay Hogan | lindsay.hogan.2@bc.edu |
| Computer Science | Maira Samary | maira.marquessamary@bc.edu |
| Earth & Env. Sciences | Jeremy Shakun | jeremy.shakun@bc.edu |
| Earth & Env. Sciences | Katrina O'Blenes | katrina.oblenes@bc.edu |
| Economics | Donald Cox | donald.cox@bc.edu |
| Engineering | Jenna Tonn | jenna.tonn@bc.edu |
| English | Marla DeRosa | marla.derosa@bc.edu |
| English | Aeron Hunt | aeron.hunt@bc.edu |
| Environmental Studies | Tara Pisani Gareau | tara.pisanigareau@bc.edu |
| ESGS - Asian Studies | Lydia Chiang | singchen.chiang@bc.edu |
| ESGS - German Studies | Danny Bowles | daniel.bowles@bc.edu |
| ESGS - Near Eastern | Atef Ghobrial (this year only) | atef.ghobrial@bc.edu |
| ESGS - Slavic Studies | Tony H. Lin | tony.h.lin@bc.edu |
| ESGS- Linguistics | Margaret Thomas | margaret.thomas@bc.edu |
| Global Public Health and the Common Good | Philip Landrigan | phil.landrigan@bc.edu |
| History (Core) | Ling Zhang | ling.zhang.2@bc.edu |
| History (Major) | Penelope Ismay | penelope.ismay@bc.edu |
| International Studies | Hiroshi Nakazato | hiroshi.nakazato@bc.edu |
| Islamic Civilization & Society | Kathleen Bailey | kathleen.bailey@bc.edu |
| Mathematics | Juliana Belding | juliana.belding@bc.edu |
| Music | Jeremiah McGrann | jeremiah.mcgrann@bc.edu |
| Philosophy | Micah Lott | micah.lott@bc.edu |
| Physics | Michael Graf | michael.graf@bc.edu |
| Political Science | Alice Behnegar | alice.behnegar@bc.edu |
| Psych.and Neuroscience | Andrea Heberlein | andrea.heberlein@bc.edu |
| Romance Languages & Literatures | Franco Mormando | franco.mormando@bc.edu |
| Sociology | Gustavo Morello, S.J. | gustavo.morello@bc.edu |
| Theater | Luke Jorgensen | luke.jorgensen@bc.edu |
| Theology | Jeffrey Cooley | jeffrey.cooley@bc.edu |
Spring 2024 Complex Problems and Enduring Questions Courses
Complex Problem Courses
Complex Problem courses are six-credit courses, team-taught by two professors from different disciplines. Students meet multiple days each week for lectures and once per week for lab. Students and faculty also gather for weekly Reflection sessions, which may involve group activities; guest speakers, or field trips off campus. Each paired Complex Problem course fulfills two Core requirements. Some may fill an additional Core requirement for Cultural Diversity, through either Difference, Justice and the Common Good (DJCG) or Engaging Difference and Justice (EDJ).
If you have any questions about these courses or how to register, e-mail core@bc.edu.
Faith, Ethics, and the Sciences in the 21st Century
THEO1723 + PHIL1723
▶ Fulfills 1 Theology (Christian Theology) + 1 Philosophy
Stephen Pope, Theology
Holly VandeWall, Philosophy
John Yargo, Core Fellow, English
The rise of modern science has raised and continues to raise a wide range of questions for both religious belief and religiously based morality. The sciences have made it clear that the cosmos is much older and much bigger than the pre-moderns had recognized. The sciences are often taken as challenging traditional views of religion, morality, and the world. Contemporary critics regard religion as either obsolete or a threat to humanity. Why have the modern sciences been taken to carry these implications and need they be taken in this way? Alternatively, can the sciences play a constructive role in how we think about faith, ethics, and human nature? Can contemporary believers fully accept the findings of science? If so, how might doing so influence how believers think about God and God’s relation to the world. This course will be team-taught by a philosopher and a theologian who have been researching the relationships between natural science and religious belief. We will explore the implications of modern physics and evolutionary biology for Jewish and Christian understandings of human origins, the good life, and ethical responsibility for ourselves, our communities, and our wider natural world.
These course lectures meet:
•TTH 3–4:15 pm
You must select one of the following lab selections with your registration:
- M 9 – 10:50 a.m.
- M 11:00 a.m. – 12:50 p.m.
- F 9:00 – 10:50 a.m.
- F 12:00 – 1:50 p.m.
Reflection will be held:
- TH 6:00 – 7:15 p.m.
Understanding and Protecting Our Oceans in the Wake of Global Change
BIOL1706 + ENVS1705
▶ Fulfills 2 Natural Science + 1 Cultural Diversity Through EDJ
Heather Olins, Biology
Vena Offen, Core Fellow, Environmental Studies
Courtney Humphries, Core Fellow, Environmental Sciences
The ocean, which covers more than 70 percent of the Earth’s surface, is vital to human societies. Yet, we have better maps of Mars than our own sea floor. This course introduces students to what we know and don’t know about the marine realm, focusing on biodiversity and ecosystem services. It then describes the effects of global change on the ocean—including rising temperatures, acidification, and sea level rise—and the resulting impact on life within and outside of the ocean. We end discussing the importance of effective governance and explore innovative ways in which people are working to repair and protect the ocean.
These course lectures meet:
- TTH 10:30 – 11:45 a.m.
You must select one of the following lab selections with your registration:
- M 9 – 10:50 a.m.
- M 11:00 a.m. – 12:50 p.m.
- W 9:00 – 10:50 a.m.
- W 11:00 a.m. – 12:50 p.m.
Reflection will be held:
- T 6:00 – 7:15 p.m.
Enduring Question Courses
Enduring Question courses are two linked three-credit courses taught by professors from different disciplines. The same 19 students take both classes. Four times during the semester, students and faculty gather for Reflection sessions, which may involve group activities, guest speakers, or field trips off campus. Each pair of Enduring Questions courses fulfills two Core requirements. Some may fill an additional Core requirement for Cultural Diversity through either Difference, Justice and the Common Good (DJCG) or Engaging Difference and Justice (EDJ).
If you have any questions about these courses or how to register, e-mail core@bc.edu.
Constructing Deviance: Madmen, Hysterics, and Criminals (GERM1701)
Constructing Deviance: Power, Control, Resistance (SOCY1710)
▶ Fulfills 1 Literature + 1 Cultural Diversity through EDJ + 1 Social Science
Daniel Bowles, Eastern, Slavic, and German Studies
Stephen Pfohl, Sociology
Why do we define ourselves against, and try to control, what we perceive as deviant, different, and abnormal?
How societies reckon with behaviors that deviate from powerful social norms has long haunted both social scientific inquiry and the literary imagination. These paired courses explore the historical construction, enforcement, and transgression of normative boundaries separating conformity from deviance. Exploring the politics and poetics of deviance from the perspectives of both literature and sociology, both courses invite critical reflection on dominant religious, legal, medical, and cultural practices of social control and the challenges they face from behaviors that violate conventional rituals of spirituality, economic life, sexuality, political authority, morality, mental well-being, aesthetics, and criminal law.
These course lectures meet:
- MWF 11:00 – 11:50 a.m.
- TTH 1:30 – 2:45 p.m.
Reflection will be held:
- TH 6:00 – 7:50 p.m. (By arrangement)
Global Health Inequities and Disparities (UNAS1732)
▶ Fulfills 1 Social Science + 1 Cultural Diversity through EDJ
Tara Casebolt, Core Fellow, Global Public Health and the Common Good
How do we, as a global society, perpetuate inequalities and disparities in health? And why do we continue to tolerate them?
This class will focus on the social factors that impact health outcomes in a global context. Using a combination of documentary films, scientific studies, case studies, and statistical analysis, we will assess how people around the world experience health and healthcare differently. Specifically, this course will focus on disparities in health outcomes and the accessibility of healthcare services based on race, ethnicity, education, income, class, caste, sex, gender, sexuality, place, and environment and how these identities intersect. We will also assess differences in health equity issues between countries of different income levels. The social determinants of health model will be used to frame these disparities.
This course lecture meets:
- TTH 1:30 – 2:45 p.m.
Life, Liberty, and Health: The Economics of Healthcare (ECON1702)
Life, Liberty, and Health: Policy, Politics, and Law (UNAS1702)
▶ Fulfills 1 Social Science + 1 History II + Cultural Diversity through EDJ
Tracy Regan, Economics
Mary Ann Chirba, BC Law School
Why is healthcare so interconnected with policy, law, and economics?
We have rights to vote and free speech, but do we have a right to health? With the global COVID-19 pandemic, access to healthcare and health insurance have become more important than ever in the pursuit of life, liberty, and health. Topics include the history of our healthcare system, prescription drug costs, vaccine mandates, the opioid crisis, youth vaping, and sports-related concussions. Such complex issues are best understood through interdisciplinary study. Through the lens of contemporary problems, students will learn basic principles of economics and law, and examine how they intersect to drive health policy involving the enduring questions of government authority and individual autonomy, morality and ethics, and social justice and human rights.
These course lectures meet:
- MW 12:00 – 1:15 p.m.
- MW 1:30 – 2:45 p.m.
Reflection will be held:
- W 6:00 – 7:50 p.m. (By arrangement)
Love, Gender, and Marriage: Writing & Rewriting the Tradition (ENGL1704)
Love, Gender, and Marriage: The Western Literary Tradition (RLRL1701)
▶ Fulfills 1 Writing + 1 Literature
Treseanne Ainsworth, English
Franco Mormando, Romance Languages and Literatures
What are the nature and role of romantic love,
marriage, and gender in human life and society?
These courses explore the concept of “romantic love” from the Middle Ages through the present, examining the meaning of marriage and gender and legal, literary, and theological texts. This section of First-Year Writing Seminar prepares students for writing at the college level in a variety of genres and across disciplines.
These course lectures meet:
- TTH 12:00 – 1:15 p.m.
- TTH 4:30 – 5:45 p.m.
Reflection will be held:
- TH 6:00 – 7:50 p.m. (By arrangement)
Making American Landscapes: Building and Living in Asian America (HIST1730)
Making American Landscapes: Geographies of Race, Place, and Power (ENVS1703)
▶ Fulfills 1 History II + 1 Social Science
Honyang Yang, Core Fellow, History
Robin Wright, Core Felow, Environmental Studies
What does it mean to belong in America?
As Dorothy says in The Wizard of Oz, “There’s no place like home.” In her adventures, Dorothy realizes that a sense of belonging comes from feeling “at home” in a particular place. Yet in the U.S., the struggle to belong, to find one’s place, has never been as simple as clicking one’s heels. These paired courses explore how in the United States, a sense of belonging is tied to a set of ideas and practices about race and space. Students will engage in interdisciplinary thinking through the fields of Geography, Whiteness Studies, Architectural History, and Asian American Studies to learn about the ramifications of racism and racial inequity as well as the resilience of communities through studying places. Collectively we will explore how certain spatial policies and practices mediate racial identities, and how race and racism have shaped a wide swath of spatial policies in the U.S., ranging from westward expansion and plantation slavery, urban development, and incarceration, to the places Asian immigrants and Asian Americans inhabited and designed as results of exclusionary immigration laws and cultural resilience. To apply learned knowledge, students will participate in mapping projects and contribute to developing the “Immigrant History Trail” in Boston’s Chinatown.
These course lectures meet:
Section 01
- TTH 9:00 – 10:15 a.m.
- TTH 10:30 – 11:45 a.m.
OR
Section 02
- TTH 12:00 – 1:15 p.m.
- TTH 1:30 – 2:45 p.m.
Reflection will be held:
- TH 6:00 – 7:50 p.m. (By arrangement)
The Making of the Modern Mind: Morality (POLI1034)
The Making of the Modern Mind: Mathematics (MATH1702)
▶ Fulfills 1 Social Science + 1 Math
Ryan Hanley, Political Science
Avner Ash, Mathematics
What are the relationships, both diachronic and synchronic, between knowledge as pursued in the sciences and values as held by the philosophical humanities?
Modern mathematics, science, even computers, all arose in the 17th century. New moral problems began to be articulated and old ones rethought. Our courses are devoted to this transformative period in moral and mathematical thought, with a focus on how these changes have shaped the ways in which we think and act today. We concentrate on three major thinkers who transformed mathematics and morals in the 17th century: Descartes, Pascal, and Leibniz. We will attempt to understand how a new, abstract algebra came into being and what it meant for the development of the “exact” sciences and for science in general. On the philosophical side, we will examine ways in which our three thinkers used their methods to understand concepts ranging from love, faith, and grace, to virtue, justice, and happiness. We will also investigate how mathematical and moral thought influenced each other, and how their volatile mixture persists in important issues of the 21st century. What help can we derive from the thoughts of our trio, each of whom was both a mathematician and a philosopher, in shaping our own approaches to mathematics and the choices we make in our personal and political lives?
These course lectures meet:
- TTH 12:00 – 1:15 p.m.
- TTH 1:30 – 2:45 p.m.
Reflection will be held:
- TH 6:00 – 7:50 p.m. (By arrangement)
Revolutionary Media: How Books Changed History (HIST1705)
Revolutionary Media: How Reading Changed Us (ENGL1715)
▶ Fulfills 1 History I + 1 Literature
Virginia Reinburg, History
Mary Crane, English
How have books and reading shaped the modern world?
The printed book has been the most powerful and disruptive medium of communication the world has seen. Today, as new technologies and media also compete for our attention, it is especially important to understand the role books have played in Western culture, and how various modes of reading have shaped our minds. One of these courses traces the revolutionary history of the book in Europe from 1450 to 1800. The other focuses on the ways in which different media have, from 1450 up to the present, demanded different strategies for reading.
These course lectures meet:
- TTH 12:00 – 1:15 p.m.
- TTH 1:30 – 2:45 p.m.
Reflection will be held:
- TH 6:00 – 7:50 p.m. (By arrangement)
Reading In/Justice: Literature as Activism from Abolition to #BlackLivesMatter (ENGL1718)
Writing In/Justice: The Power of Response (ENGL1719)
▶ Fulfills 1 Writing + 1 Literature + 1 Cultural Diversity through DJCG
Alex Puente, English
Lori Harrison-Kahan, English
How does reading literature about injustice and inequality compel us to respond through writing?
In these courses, students will read and write about justice and injustice from the time of the abolitionist movement through current human rights crises. They will explore multiple genres—poetry, fiction, autobiography, drama, and graphic narratives—as well as journalism and social media. Students will learn to identify literary and rhetorical techniques in a variety of texts and to employ those techniques in their own writing. Questions include: What is the relationship between language and power? How have writers and activists deployed language and storytelling to draw attention to injustices and effect societal change? How do historical works speak to present social issues? How does reading about injustice and inequality compel us to write and to act? How might lived encounters with injustice—through family histories, personal experienc es, and service—inspire us to write and to deepen our knowledge through reading?
These course lectures meet:
- MWF 10:00 – 10:50 a.m.
- TTH 10:30 – 11:45 a.m.
Reflection will be held:
- W 6:00 – 7:50 p.m. (By arrangement)
Reflection and Formation
Reflection is a central element of student formation at Boston College. Reflection sessions are a fundamental component of the design of Complex Problem and Enduring Question courses, where students are provided time outside of lecture to connect course material to their whole selves. In Reflection sessions, students connect the content of the course materials with their lives beyond the classroom, and to the larger University community. In this way, Reflection is intimately tied to the Core learning goal designed to teach students how to “examine their values and experiences and integrate what they learn with the principles that guide their lives.” Reflection sessions can provide a space for discussion for the ethical implications of material covered in the course and may help students process their reactions to difficult course materials. Additionally, Reflection provides opportunities for ideas and practices associated with formative experiences at Boston College to emerge.
Faculty and student creativity flourish in Reflection sessions. Here are some examples of past Reflection activities:
Practices:
- A session on the Jesuit Examen led by someone from Mission and Ministry
- A workshop teaching students about different meditative practices
- A yoga workshop
- A workshop on reflective journaling
- An e-media fast, students abstain from all electronic devices and media for 24 hours
- Students practiced silence for increasingly long periods of time
Exercises:
- Course on migration, students were shown an array of timeworn objects and asked to write narratives about the journey of a chosen object. Students then shared their narratives and discussed their own experiences of migration.
- Course on gender, students divided into groups to create collages from magazine images illustrating the role of mass media in reinforcing or challenging traditional gender stereotypes.
- Course on books and media, Conservator from Burns library led a session in which students played the role of 16th-century apprentices in a print shop and used bookbinding tools to create a vellum pamphlet.
- Course on climate change, student participation in a World Food Banquet to reflect on world food issues.
Field trips:
- Museum of Fine Arts to visit the new Islamic Arts exhibition to study maps
- Mount Auburn Cemetery to consider the meaning of life and death
- Cape Cod beaches to observe and compare signs of sea level change on a pristine and developed coast. Dinner at a faculty member’s home
- Walden Pond to reflect on the live experiences of Henry David Thoreau
Guest Speakers:
- BC Career Center speaker discussing career opportunities related to the course
- Panel of veterans discussing the experience of war
- Kwame Appiah lecturing on cosmopolitanism and the legacy of empires
- Students attended talks in the Environmental Studies lecture series on climate change
PODs (Purposeful Ongoing Discussion) in Complex Problem courses only
- Reflection model that involves selecting upperclassmen as POD leaders who meet with students in small groups to discuss adjusting to life at BC and to reflect on course material. The POD mentors are trained and closely mentored by course instructors.
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Students gathering at the World Food Banquet to reflect on world food issues
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Visit to the Museum of Fine Arts to see the new Islamic Arts exhibition
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Students gathering at the World Food Banquet to reflect on world food issues