Ethical Inquiry, Social Responsibility, and Citizenship

Spring 2013 Ethical Inquiry courses

USM's Ethical Inquiry, Social Responsibility, and Citizenship (EISRC) requirement engages students in critical reflection on their responsibilities for informed decision making and action in their public and private roles.  It requires students to frame, analyze, and evaluate ethical issues, as well as to articulate and evaluate their own viewpoints and actions in relation to the ethical frameworks introduced.

Ethical Inquiry, Social Responsibility, and Citizenship is our common teaching and learning experience as a community.  It is taught by a wide range of our faculty across nearly all of our departments and colleges and is required of all USM students, regardless of transfer credits.  This shared experience allows us to develop and sustain common conversations about the issues that matter to us, even in the face of our diverse backgrounds, experiences, and future paths. Our common conversations are also supported by the use of selected common texts in our EISRC courses (see below).

For this reason, USM's transfer policy for EISRC courses is more restrictive than it is for other USM Core courses.  Specifically, students transferring 84 or more credits may submit for consideration a course that they regard as equivalent to the Ethical Inquiry, Social Responsibility, and Citizenship requirement.  This course must have been completed at a 4 year college or university and must be at the intermediate level or above.  Submissions should be sent to the Assistant Provost for Undergraduate Programs and Core Curriculum at smcwilms@usm.maine.edu.

Resources for EISRC Faculty and Students

Fall 2012 EISRC courses, descriptions and schedule

EISRC Common Texts

The common texts for 2011-2012 are:

The Apology of Socrates (Plato)

How Good People Make Tough Choices (Rushworth Kidder)

Letter from a Birmingham Jail (Martin Luther King, Jr.)

Tragedy of the Commons (Garrett Hardin)

Woman at Point Zero (Nawal El Saadawi) 

Copies of these common texts are available.  Please e-mail smcwilms@usm.maine.edu