Office of the Registrar

Restriction: University College.

Epidemiology of Everyday Life (3) Buried inside each of us is an innate statistician. We receive data everyday, assess its quality, compare it to other data we have received, and analyze it to make decisions about our lives. Too often people are intimidated by numbers and Greek letters to uncover the intuition behind statistical analyses and reports. As a result, we end up not evaluating numerical analyses that come our way all of the time; some we trust too much, others we trust too little. This course introduces the mathematics behind statistical analyses, but mathematics is not the focus of the course. The course helps students to be knowledgeable consumers of numerical data in our increasingly data-driven world.

Globalization and Education (3) In this course students are introduced to the key sociological themes and theories that help frame our understanding of globalization and its impact on education around the world. After tracing globalization's history and contemporary trends, the course turns to detailing how education, broadly conceived, is affected by globalization. This includes a critical examination of multi-lateral agencies such as the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and the United Nations/UNESCO; transformations in patterns of student mobility and migration; curricular changes and alignment such as the Bologna Process in the European Union; the emergence of global norms for education; and the use of new media and digital platforms for global educational exchange and higher education. The course uses sociological theories and frameworks to interrogate these trends and offer explanatory frameworks. Meets with EDU-396 001.

Instructional Method: Online. Intimacy and Sexuality in Contemporary Societies (3) This course examines modern-day coupling, romantic, and sexual patterns in Western societies, from "hooking up" to "getting hitched." Emphasis is on alternative lifestyles, sexual variations, the importance of love and marriage (or not), pleasuring, common sexual and relationship challenges, managing desires, and sexual health issues, e.g., the impact of sexual disorders, trauma, sex communication, pornography, sexual compulsivity, and sexual harassment. Special attention is given to cross-cultural comparisons when it comes to love, attraction, intimacy, customs, monogamy vs. polyamory, sexual relationship difficulties, and criminal sexual behaviors.