Diversity-Justice (D-J) Course Requirement

Please email the Diversity Justice Requirement Committee at djreqcommittee@loyola.edu. 

If you go to the online course catalog, ‘Advanced Search’ tab, you can select ‘Diversity-Justice’ in the ‘Course Type’ dialog box and this will provide a listing of all D-J designated course sections being taught for the term you’ve selected. Alternatively, you can search the online course catalog for the course/section you are interested in. Once you’ve found it, you can scroll to the right until you reach the column labeled ‘Course Types’. If Diversity-Justice is listed, then the section you are teaching is D-J designated.  If your section is NOT D-J designated in the catalog, but you are using (or planning to use) materials that have been D-J designated to teach the section, please speak to your Department Chair about this: even if they did not include the D-J when they submitted the master schedule, they can submit a form to Records to have the section be D-J designated. The easiest way to avoid this is to speak with your Department Chair about including the D-J designation for your section before they submit the master schedule for a given semester (assuming of course that the materials you will be using have already been D-J designated; if not, then you can submit them for designation which is typically a relatively quick and easy process).

No, course materials that have been Diversity designated (D designated) in the past are still approved for Diversity-Justice (D-J) designation. That said, a section should only carry the D-J designation if it is using the same (or comparable) materials to those that were reviewed for designation. It is the Department Chair’s responsibility to ensure that sections that are submitted to Records with a D-J designation are using the same (or comparable) materials to those that were approved.

No. In order for your section to carry the D-J designation, you will need to use the same (or comparable) materials for your section (e.g., syllabus, learning aims, assessment methods, readings, course topics) as those that were approved for D-J designation. You could then request that your Department Chair designate your section as D-J when they submitted it to records. Before doing so, your Department Chair would verify that the materials were comparable to those that were approved for D-J designation and that you were qualified to teach a D-J designated course. 

It depends.  If you and your Department Chair agree that the modified materials contain just as much (or more!) Diversity and/or Justice content (e.g., syllabus, learning aims, assessment, readings, course topics) as the designated materials, then there is no need to resubmit.  If you and/or your Department Chair aren’t sure whether or not it is comparable (or more) than the originally approved materials, please contact the Diversity Justice Requirement Committee at djreqcommittee@loyola.edu and we would be happy to assist you in making this determination.

No – as long as the course has a substantial focus on Loyola Diversity or Loyola Justice learning aims (or both), it can be approved as a Diversity-Justice course. That said, one of the reasons for the name change was the relative dearth of ‘Justice’ focused Diversity courses in the past. Thus, if Justice content/learning aims make sense for a course, it would be beneficial to incorporate them.

The determination of ‘substantial’ will be made by members of the Diversity-Justice Course Requirement Committee, which has representatives from across all University Divisions. We have switched to the term substantial (rather than a hard and fast numerical percentage) because: 

1) we understand that substantial might mean different percentages for different divisions, departments, and specific courses; and 

2) it is challenging for reviewers to determine an accurate percentage based on the application materials (syllabus, course description, etc.); and 

3) it is possible for individual components, examples, or assignments for a course can have an indelible effect on a student’s understanding of diversity and justice regardless of percentage. 

If you (and/or your department) are uncertain, the Diversity-Justice Requirement Committee is happy to work with you to infuse your course(s) with diversity and justice content or application. It is a collaborative effort that allows us to have important pedagogical conversations.

No, it is possible to have a course approved for Diversity-Justice designation with only a single Diversity-Justice designation. As long as the course has a substantial focus on Loyola Diversity or Loyola Justice learning aims (or both), it can be approved as a Diversity-Justice course.  For example, it is possible to have a course with a single Diversity-Justice learning aim that still substantially infuses Diversity and or Justice into topics, readings, assessments, etc.

No, you are allowed to tailor the assessment method(s) for your Diversity-Justice learning aims to your course, teaching methods, etc. Some methods we have seen include: essays, prompts to address as part of a paper/project, quizzes/exams and/or specific questions on quizzes/exams, presentations (or D-J specific prompts to answer as part of a presentation), etc.

Yes! If you believe that your course has ‘substantial’ focus on Diversity-Justice learning aim(s), we would love for you to submit it to the Diversity-Justice Requirement Committee to be D-J Designated. However, it is certainly possible for a course to have a D-J learning aim(s) (and corresponding D-J content, assessment, etc.) without necessarily being substantially focused on these aims. In these instances, it would be amazing to include the D-J learning aim(s) (and corresponding D-J content, assessment, etc.) in the course even in the absence of a D-J designation. There is evidence for many academic disciplines to indicate that the incorporation of D-J content into courses increases student engagement as well as learning.

The initial requirement – the Diversity Course Requirement – was adopted by the Academic Senate after a broad and collaborative effort among academic departments and individual faculty and administrators. After a series of faculty meetings to discuss the need for and nature of a diversity requirement for the campus in early 2002, the Undergraduate Curriculum Committee (UCC) invited faculty to submit full proposals for a requirement. During fall 2002, the UCC discussed three proposals and a survey of comparable university’s curricular diversity requirements, and decided to move forward with modifications of one of the proposals. Faculty committees and academic administrators contributed to revisions of the proposal through the spring 2003 semester, submitting a draft to the UCC in May 2003. Once the UCC approved the draft, it was forwarded to the Academic Senate in September 2003. After vigorous deliberation, the Academic Senate passed the proposed diversity course requirement in March 2004. The Diversity Course Requirement became a graduation requirement for all undergraduate students beginning with the Class of 2010.

In March 2010, the UCC Subcommittee on Diversity (UCCSD) undertook a comprehensive review of the requirement, including an audit of diversity-designated courses, survey data, and consultation of the original Senate documents. They issued a 60-page report that included several recommendations and appendices. (Report available from current UCC Chair.) The Academic Senate used that subcommittee report to create a charge for an ad hoc Committee to Review the Diversity Course Requirement.  That ad hoc committee: revised the definitions of the diversity categories, created related learning aims, affirmed that faculty must apply under one category, and devised a renewal process that mirror the application process (per original Academic Senate mandate). The committee also proposed two mandatory questions on the student evaluation form of any diversity-designated course, which can inform a faculty member’s reflection in the renewal process and may play a role in a future assessment of the university-wide diversity learning aim. After some debate and clarifications, the Academic Senate accepted the ad hoc committee’s report and approved the recommendations on December 4, 2012. The UCCSD began to use the new materials in spring 2011 and began the four-semester process of catching up on the backlog of renewals. The Office of Institutional Research administers the two diversity questions on student evaluation forms for all diversity-designated courses.

In response to concerns that the undergraduate Diversity Course Requirement was not adequately contributing to addressing student Diversity and Justice learning aims, Loyola University Maryland formed the inaugural Faculty Equity and Inclusion Fellows in AY 2020-21. As detailed in their Final Report, an interdisciplinary subgroup of these Fellows recommended a number of changes to the Diversity Course Requirement, based on primary and secondary data they collected from internal and external sources. An interdisciplinary subgroup of Faculty Equity and Inclusion Fellows in AY 2021-22 were tasked with implementing these recommendations. As detailed in their Final Report, several steps were taken to refine the recommendations based on stakeholder input: student and faculty listening sessions were held, the UCC was repeatedly consulted, and meetings were held with key administrators (e.g., the Provost, Chief Equity and Inclusion Officer, and Diversity and Inclusion Specialist).

Based upon this feedback, it was proposed that administration of the Diversity Course Requirement be moved from the UCCSD to a newly created Diversity Course Requirement Committee. The change was to allow Diversity Course Requirement Committee members to focus on administering the Diversity Course Requirement without the added labor and time burden of being a UCC member. The proposal to create this Committee successfully passed through the governance process in Spring of 2022 and this Committee was populated by the Faculty Affairs Committee and began meeting in Fall of 2022. This committee was charged with administering the Diversity Course Requirement, reviewing proposals, assessing outcomes, suggesting changes related to the requirement, and overseeing potential changes to the requirement that are approved through appropriate governance channels.

Also based upon this feedback, a proposal for curricular changes to the Diversity Course Requirement was drafted, garnered unanimous approval by the UCC in the Spring of 2022, and was submitted to the Chair of the Faculty in April 2022, presented to the ECG in October 2022, and brought before Loyola’s academic senate in February 2023. Revisions to the proposal were made in response to feedback from Academic Senators and their constituents. The Academic Senate voted to consider the motion with these revisions in April of 2023 and passed this motion in May 2024.

Although the full details can be found in the Senate Motion, here is a summary of the changes: the Diversity Course Requirement was renamed the Diversity-Justice Requirement to highlight the importance of social justice in our undergraduate curriculum and to better align with Loyola’s core values. Students joining Loyola under the AY2024-2025 Catalogue and beyond are required to successfully complete two Diversity-Justice designated courses anywhere in their curriculum. Students joining Loyola under the AY2027-2028 Catalogue and beyond will be required to successfully complete three Diversity-Justice designated courses with one in their major and the other two anywhere in their curriculum.

The UCC conducts periodic audits to assure sufficient offerings to enable students to graduate with reasonable planning, in consultation with academic deans who sit on the UCC. Assessment for individual courses happens at the Department level. Any future University-level assessment of the diversity learning aim should account for the significant contribution of the Diversity Course Requirement.
• 2004 initial creation of Diversity Course Requirement 
Approved by the UCC May 2003. Approved by the Academic Senate March 2004.
• 2012 report on the Diversity Course Requirement   
Submitted by the Ad Hoc Committee to Review the Diversity Course Requirement. Approved by the Academic Senate December 4, 2012