Goals and Student Outcomes: Religious Studies

Department Goals and Objectives

Goals are broad statements that describe what the program wants to accomplish

1. Majors will acquire specialized knowledge in at least one religious tradition, including its histories, rituals, beliefs, and ongoing issues through close examination of diverse bodies of evidence (religious texts, traditions, material cultures, and secondary scholarship).
2. Gain proficiency in the interdisciplinary methodologies of Religious Studies (social scientific, literary, historical, theoretical, philosophical and cultural), while learning to evaluate the utility of these disciplinary approaches, and cultivate attitudes of empathetic study as well as critical distance toward objects of study.
3. Be able to place religious traditions, issues, and debates in broader global and political contexts, with special sensitivities to the roles that religions can and do play in the articulation of national, racial, and gender identities.
4. Learn how to conduct extended research that critically analyzes the theoretical implications of a religious phenomenon across broader social and cultural perspectives.

Student Learning Outcomes

Outcomes describe specific knowledge, abilities, values, and attitudes students should demonstrate

• SLO1: Students will demonstrate knowledge of the contexts and contents of one specific religious tradition.
• SLO2: Students will be able to select and apply an interdisciplinary framework to the study of a particular religious phenomenon and demonstrate its intellectual effectiveness.
• SLO3: Students will be able to connect religious traditions, issues, and debates across global and political contexts in designated assignments.
• SLO4: Students will independently develop, investigate, and synthesize a research topic on a religious phenomenon.