Felician University’s General Education Program Overview 2025-2026 Implementation

General Education Mission:

Felician University’s General Education program empowers students for lifelong success in an ever-changing academic, social, and global landscape through its focus on curricular innovation, connected learning, and personal and professional growth.

General Education Description:

Felician University’s General Education program is completed by all baccalaureate students and is designed to address contemporary and future challenges, providing students with the knowledge and skills needed to navigate a rapidly changing world. The program provides students with a comprehensive and diverse educational experience that cultivates critical thinking, interdisciplinary understanding, and global awareness.  General Education at Felician University reflects the unique mission of the University and is centered around four foundational pillars that emphasize critical thinking, cultural competency, ethical reasoning and the development of essential skills.  Experiential learning is a feature of the program to engage students in applied experiences through service-learning, research and international exposure.  This innovative curriculum is designed to provide students with a well-rounded education that draws students into new areas of intellectual experience, expand their cultural and global awareness and cultural sensitivity, and to prepare them to make well-reasoned judgments within and outside of their chosen academic fields.  The program integrates the development of critical skills such as oral and written communication, scientific and quantitative reasoning, critical analysis and reasoning, technological competency, and information literacy. Consistent with Felician University’s mission, the general education program includes the study of values, ethics, diversity and cultivates interdisciplinary knowledge to build global perspectives and practical experiences.

General Education Vision:

Felician University provides a transformative general education experience, engaging our students in connected learning and personal and professional growth to:

• Develop the ability to solve problems through creative and critical strategies
• Foster correlations between new learning and old learning
• Understand the histories, systems, and processes that underlie cultures – both global and American
• Develop a purposeful self, grounded in spiritual values, focused on one’s own wellness, and engaged in academic and professional advancement
• Strengthen communication skills and functional ability in technological & information literacies 

Pillar 1: Critical Mind (9 credits):

The Critical Mind Pillar prepares students to reason, integrate, and apply critical thinking and problem-solving skills in innovative and imaginative ways. Through transformative coursework, students will evaluate and synthesize new content creatively and independently to navigate the evolving landscape of the 21st century.

The goals of Pillar 1 are to integrate reasoning and problem-solving strategies to connect content to new ideas, to evaluate new material through an innovative lens and to synthesize new content with existing ideas in innovative and imaginative ways.

• English 102 is a required course under Pillar 1 and students may select an additional 6 credits from a list of courses to satisfy this requirement.

Pillar 2: Global and Intercultural Competence for Social Justice (6 credits):

The Global Cultural Competence for Social Justice pillar provides a framework to prepare students to live and work effectively in culturally diverse environments and embrace a commitment to social justice. Through diverse coursework, students become culturally self-aware and knowledgeable about global inequities; develop values and respect for the perspectives of others and become competent in their abilities to promote equity and inclusion in the greater society.

The goals of Pillar 2 are to demonstrate knowledge of one’s own and other diverse cultures, histories, and global events, to identify domestic and global viewpoints of inequity and social justice in terms of economic status, gender, class, race, and ethnicity, to analyze how inequities are perpetuated in a society through political, cultural, social, and economic structures and to exhibit competency and leadership potential in a global and diverse world.

• Students may select from a list of courses to satisfy the requirements for Pillar 2. Students who wish to study abroad may seek approval to use study abroad courses to satisfy this requirement as well.

Pillar 3: Ethics, Faith, Spirituality & Well-Being (9 Credits)

Ethics, Faith, Spirituality & Well-Being pillar provides a faith and spiritual framework to prepare students to care for themselves and others with an emphasis on physical, emotional, and social wellbeing. Through introspective coursework, students are supported in developing resiliency, empathy, and spiritual awareness to foster a sense of higher purpose that embodies leadership, citizenship, service, and Franciscan values.

The goals of Pillar 3 are to exhibit a healthy regard for oneself and an ability to foster mutually beneficial relationships with diverse others, to demonstrate professional habits and leadership traits expected in the workplace and for advanced study and to demonstrate the ability to make choices rooted in values that are inspired by faith, spirituality, and a call to a higher purpose.

• Students are required to take 2 Religious Studies courses: one at the upper level and one at the lower level
• Students may select an additional course from a list of approved courses to satisfy this requirement; approved service-learning courses may also satisfy this requirement.

Pillar 4: The Critical Literacies – Communication, Information, and Technology (14-15 credits)

The Critical Literacies Pillar immerses students in knowledge, skills, and experiences to thrive professionally. Through diverse coursework, students will achieve competencies in data analysis; scientific reasoning; technological and digital skills; written and oral communication, and the professional and ethical applications of this knowledge.

The goals of Pillar 4 are to understand the steps in the process of developing effective communication across different media (brainstorm, organize, draft, revise, edit, publish), to demonstrate technological acumen, flexibility, extraction capabilities, and situational awareness for ethical use across multiple settings, to demonstrate effective communication skills to display comprehension of outside sources (data, readings, labs, etc.) and present claims, findings, or positions and to utilize skills or knowledge developed through critical literacy (data, technological, quantitative, scientific) to advance, deepen, or further analyze a position or topic.

• Students are required to take Math (1 Required), Natural Science (1 Required), Computer Science (1 Required), an approved public speaking course (1 Required), and English 101 (Required).

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)