BU Courses
Are you interested in taking a course related to character education or social responsibility? There is a range of courses offered at Boston University’s School of Education that may be just right for you. For the most up to date course offerings please go to the Student Link. Below are brief descriptions of several recommended courses:
Ethical Leadership: Character, Civility, and Community
Update: We are proud to announce that the Ethical Leadership MOOC may be taken, with an additional course, for graduate BU credit by BU and non-BU students. Please click here or scroll to the bottom of this page for information on how to register.
The Center for Character and Social Responsibility is proud to announce the Boston University School of Education’s first BUx Massive Open Online Course (MOOC): Ethical Leadership: Character, Civility and Community. The course is taught by Walter Earl Fluker, Martin Luther King, Jr. Professor of Ethical Leadership, School of Theology & the Graduate Division of Religious Studies, CAS.
The course is being funded by and developed with BU’s Digital Learning Initiative. The course will be offered through BUx and launches on May 24, 2016. The Ethical Leadership MOOC is now available for registration at edX.org.
This course will provide theoretical and practical approaches to the development of character, civility and community for leaders and emerging leaders in education, business, nonprofit, academic, religious, and other professions. The course examines the personal, public and spiritual dimensions of leadership within the context that Fluker calls “the intersection of lifeworlds and systems”; and outlines principles and practices of ethical leadership from a diverse field of leadership theories. Fluker’s work grounds leadership in story, the appropriation of one’s personal narrative within social and historical contexts, as a basis for personal and social transformation. A major outcome of the course is an Ethical Leadership Toolkit which will include several heuristic aids: an Ethical Leadership Model™, a Model for Ethical Decision-Making, practical exercises that are part of life-long leadership development (Remembering, Retelling and Reliving Our Stories and Looking, Listening and Learning); and a variety of aesthetic and literary sources, case studies, journaling and meditative practices.
Faculty, deans, and administrators from throughout Boston University will present their vision for ethical leadership and the role of higher education. These include: President Robert Brown, Provost Jean Morrison, Deans Hardin Coleman (SED), Mary Elizabeth Moore (STH), Ann Cudd (CAS), Kenn Elmore (Dean of Students), and Kenneth Freeman (Questrom School of Business), and Adil Najam (Pardee School of Global Studies).
The MOOC will also present video interviews from leadership theorists as well as prominent leaders in the areas of education, business, government and global citizenship such as: Congressman John Lewis; Ambassador Andrew Young; Dr. Jochen Fried (Salzburg Global Seminar); Dr. Walter Massey, (President, School of the Art Institute of Chicago); Chandra Taylor-Smith (Vice President, Community Conservation and Education, National Audubon Society); Nixon biographer Evan Thomas; Harvard University Business, Kennedy and Education School Professors Max Bazerman, Howard Gardner, Bill George, David Gergen, Ronald Heifetz and Barbara Kellerman.
After passing the MOOC there will be an option for BU and non-BU students to take an additional six week course in order to earn graduate credits from Boston University. If you are interested in this credit bearing course offering please contact Robin Masi for more information.
Professor Fluker is also the editor of the Howard Thurman Papers Project and Director of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Initiative for the Development of Ethical Leadership (MLK-IDEAL). This MOOC is co-sponsored with the BU School of Theology. The course is being funded by and developed with BU’s Digital Learning Initiative.
The Ethical Leadership MOOC is now available for registration at https://www.edx.org/course/ethical-leadership-character-civility-bux-leadershipx.
Registration for BU Credit for the Ethical Leadership MOOC
Students participating in the Ethical Leadership MOOC this summer may receive BU credit for their participation by registering for an additional online Ethical Leadership course, taking place from September 18 to December 12, 2017. This course may be taken for 4 graduate credits from Boston University.
We are happy to announce that the course is offered at BU’s part-time evening rate. The Registrar’s Office lists next academic year’s tuition at $797 per credit which means a 4 credit course will be $3,188 (for full details please visit the BU Registrar’s website), plus any applicable fees. Please remember you have to have passed the Ethical Leadership MOOC at 60% or higher in order to be eligible for this course.
Current BU students may access and register for this course in the academic catalog under the title “Ethical Leadership”. Non-BU students (including international students) may simply fill out the attached Registration Form and either email a completed copy to sedstu@bu.edu or mail it to:
Boston University School of Education
Records Office
2 Silber Way
Boston, MA 02215
Attn: Tom Reis – Assistant Registrar
After you have registered for the course please contact Robin Masi (elbumooc@bu.edu), who will be in touch with you for further readings and course updates.
SED IE 603 Project Analysis and Planning for Urban Educational Development: The course is designed as a workshop in which students learn a set of planning techniques and apply these techniques in the design of real projects or programs of their own choosing. Emphasis is on showing how a proposed development project can be expected to contribute, at some level, to the resolution of an important social problem and designing a persuasive project proposal.
