Guidelines and Information on Proposal Submission

Timeline and Process for the Submission and Review of GE Course Proposals

Staff members who wish to propose a GE course should submit their course proposals through respective College/School Boards to the Talent and Education Development Office (TED). The Gateway Education Programme Committee (GEPC) will assess the proposals and make recommendations to the Board of Undergraduate Studies (BUS).

Talent and Education Development Office receives new GE course proposals from College/School Boards all year round. Approvals will be given by the Academic Policy Committee (APC) through BUS on a semester basis. For the sake of clarity, indicative deadlines for proposal submission are given in Table 1 for reference.

Table 1: Timeline for GE proposal submission

Deadlines to submit GE course proposal to GEPC	Deadlines to submit GE minor changes to GEPC	Gateway Education Programme Committee (GEPC)	Deadlines for GEPC to submit papers to BUS	Board of Undergraduate Studies (BUS)	Academic Policy Committee (APC)
25 July 2023	01 August 2023	04 September 2023	12 September 2023	26 September 2023	19 October 2023
26 September 2023	03 October 2023	31 October 2023	14 November 2023	28 November 2023	21 December 2023
28 November 2023	12 December 2023	09 January 2024	23 January 2024	06 February 2024	07 March 2024
13 February 2024	20 February 2024	19 March 2024	02 April 2024	16 April 2024	09 May 2024

The proposals should be sent by the above deadlines through gateway.edu@cityu.edu.hk. Course designers should use the Course syllabus template (GE) to submit their proposals. GEPC will review the GE course proposals with reference to the criteria for assessing GE course proposals stipulated by GEPC. An Assessment Form is used to collect comments from GEPC members on every GE course proposal. The Fulbright Scholars will serve as external members in the GEPC and contribute to the assessment of GE proposals. When the views of GEPC members and external members are in consensus, the course proposal will be recommended for APC approval through BUS. In case of diverging views, additional external reviewers may be sought.

Throughout the course development and assessment processes, the GEPC members will work collegially and closely with proposers to improve their proposals to meet the requirements of the GE programme.

Criteria for Assessment

The assessment seeks evidence of alignment between Course Intended Learning Outcomes (CILOs) and GE Programme Intended Learning Outcomes (PILOs), appropriateness of pedagogy (teaching and learning methods as well as assessment), and the availability of the required expertise in the offering units.

GEPC seeks to ensure that the following desired attributes are embraced in every course proposal:

Course title that reflects content and communicates to a general student population.
150-word abstract, written for students, that describes the course aims, content, and types of learning activities.
Clear presentation throughout the proposal on an overarching theme around which the course is organised and structured.
List of consulted parties related to resource implications. Proposers should consult expertise in other related discipline if the proposal covers content beyond their own discipline.

Succeeding sessions highlight some key issues in course development.

Curricular Mapping

GE courses should be designed to achieve the Programme Intended Learning Outcomes (PILOs) with different levels of depth and breadth. Every GE course should significantly address PILO 1 and PILO 10. Each area must also address those outcomes that have been specified as "Required" in the curricular mapping of GE programme approved by the City University's Senate (see Table 2 below). Each distributional area should satisfy at least one of the stated outcomes from PILOs 5 to 9.

Programme Learning Outcomes (PILOs)	Distributional Requirements			University Requirements
Programme Learning Outcomes (PILOs)	Arts & Humanities	Study of Societies, Social and Business Organisations	Science & Technology	English	Chinese Civilisation – History and Philosophy
Demonstrate the capacity for self-directed learning	R	R	R	R	R
Explain the basic methodologies and techniques of inquiry of the arts and humanities, social sciences, business, and science and technology	R	R	R	O
Demonstrate critical thinking skills	R	R	R
Interpret information and numerical data	O	R	R
Produce structured, well-organised, and fluent text	Every course in the distributional areas is required to achieve at least one of these outcomes.			R	O
Demonstrate effective oral communication skills				R	R
Demonstrate an ability to work effectively in a team				R	R
Recognise important characteristics of their own culture(s) and at least one other culture, and their impact on global issues				O	R
Value ethical and socially responsible actions				O	R
Demonstrate the attitude and/or ability to accomplish discovery and/or innovation	R	R	R	R	R

R: Required
O: Optional

Desired characteristics of GE courses

To facilitate course designers to interpret the GE PILOs, it is required that the following desired characteristics of GE courses should be embedded in every GE course:

Adopt an interdisciplinary frame of reference to foster an appreciation of the relations among different fields of knowledge
Emphasise intellectual content as well as generic skills in communication, inquiry, thinking, problem solving and teamwork
Introduce essential concepts, methods, and orienting conceptual frameworks of the subjects concerned
Utilise engaged pedagogies
Provide the intellectual depth expected of credit-bearing university courses at the same level
Relate the subject matters to modern human experience
Encourage self-discovery and reflection

Strategies of teaching and learning in GE courses

Pedagogy should play an important role in the delivery of your course content. Courses that allow for in-class discussions, analyses of major issues impacting your discipline and its relationships to other knowledge areas, and projects that engage students in their learning will have a long-term impact. In your GE course proposal, you should attempt to show the teaching and learning strategies which you intend to use to actively engage your students to achieve the GE PILOs.

The above syllabi do an excellent job of linking teaching and learning strategies to stated Course Intended Learning Outcomes and reflect many of the desired characteristics of GE courses (using engaged pedagogies, moving away from strictly exam-based assessments, etc.) They also expand their keyword syllabi on the topics/issues covered in the courses.

Support for GE course development

Expert Advice:

During the proposal development stage, course designers are encouraged to seek advice from members of the GEPC. GEPC may also contact proposers as appropriate to identify issues for improvement.

Resources

Proposers are strongly encouraged to contact the following units to consult the resource implications of their proposals and obtain support:

Unit	Contact Person
Academic Regulations and Records Office (on class-scheduling)	Miss WONG Ka Ying
Library (on reading materials)	Miss Celia CHOW
Talent and Education Development Office	Mr Frankie FAN