CurriculuM - Winter 2009 Semester
Note: the curriculum for winter 2010 will be similar but not exactly the same as
what you see below. Among other potential changes, there will be a wider range of elective course available next year.
The Semester in Detroit (SID) Curriculum
Note: All of the courses listed below will be made available to everyone accepted into the Semester in Detroit program. Once you are accepted into the program, you will be given permission by all of the instructors listed below to register for these classes.
Required Courses:
- RC SSCI 360, Section 004: Planning Detroit: Past, Present, and Future (3 credits)
This core course will be required for all students enrolled in Semester in Detroit. Taught by Dr. June Thomas, a long-time urban planning scholar and professor in the UM Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, this course will explore Detroit’s planning history since the postwar period into the present day. Using a combination of readings, presentations, and physical tours around the city, this course will help unpack and explain why Detroit looks the way it does today. Class will meet Tuesdays from 2p-5p every week.
Note: this course will be applicable toward the Social Science distribution requirement for LSA students.
- RC CORE 306, Section 8: Graded Independent Study – Community Internship (4 credits)
Each Semester in Detroit student will be matched with a Detroit community or cultural arts organization – based on their interests and qualifications – for a 16-hour per week internship experience. In most cases, students will spend all day Monday and Wednesday at their internship site. Dr. Charles Bright (Professor of History and RC Director) will be the faculty sponsor for this 4-credit course.
- RC CORE 306, Section 77: Graded Independent Study – Reflective Seminar (2 credits)
All Semester in Detroit students will gather together once every week for two hours to reflect on their internship experience. RC/CAAS Assistant Professor, Stephen Ward, will be the faculty of record for this seminar. Craig Regester, SID Associate Director, will facilitate the weekly reflective seminars. This seminar will meet Thursdays from 10am-12pm every week.
UM Elective Courses: (choose from between 1-3)
- RC SSCI 461, Section 1/CAAS 458: Students on Strike: Race, Education, and Youth Activism, 1966 and Today (3 credits)
This class is a collaboration with Detroit’s renowned Mosaic Youth Theatre. It will provide an in-depth look at the turbulent 1960s in Detroit, focusing on youth activism and the ways that struggles over education and race shaped the city’s history. Our focus will be on a dramatic but not well known event in Detroit’s history: the 1966 student walkout at Northern High School. Northern students were joined by students across the city protesting racism in the schools, leading to the establishment of a freedom school. The course will involve students in first-hand oral history and archival methods to uncover and organize material about this event to be used by Mosaic Youth Theatre to stage a new theatrical production during their 2009-2010 season. Class will meet Thursdays from 2p-5p every week.
- RC HUMS 334, Section 007: Writing in Detroit: Journey to the Interior (3 credits)
This humanities class will be taught by native Detroiter, Lolita Hernandez, currently a lecturer in the Creative Writing program in the Residential College. She is a well-known poet and writer who spent over twenty years working in GM’s Cadillac Plant on Clark St. in SW Detroit until the plant closed. She is the author of Autopsy of an Engine and Other Stories from the Cadillac Plant. The course will take a close look at the contemporary writing scene in Detroit, as well as provide students with ample opportunities to explore and develop their own creative writing abilities. Class will meet Tuesdays from 10a-1p every week. Note: this course will be applicable toward the Humanities distribution requirement for LSA students.
3) ART 310: Connections in the Classroom through Visual Art and Performance (3 credits)
Connecting U of M students with fourth graders at Butzel Elementary, on the east side of Detroit through semester long visual and performance art projects, this class is a combination of work with the children and contextual studies that address issues of urban schools and the radical transformation creative projects have on cognitive development. Working intensively in Detroit every Friday, students learn firsthand of the city's history and contemporary visual culture with field visits and projects. Planning for and reflecting on class projects, students develop close ties with the children and produce vibrant art that transforms the physical nature of the schools, and shared experiences across generations and cultures that transform the nature of creative work
Wayne State University Elective Courses: (optional)
Thanks to an agreement with Wayne State University’s Department of Geography and Urban Planning, Semester in Detroit students will be able to select among the following courses in addition to the UM electives described above. More detailed course descriptions will be made available later this semester. Note: by choosing any of the courses below, you would receive UM independent study credit (not WSU credit) sponsored by RC Director and Professor of History, Charles Bright. Registration for these courses will be handled by Associate Director, Craig Regester.
- Introduction to Urban Planning
- Introduction to Urban Studies
- Geographic Information Systems
- Cities and Regions
- Introduction to Urban Geography
- Urban Sustainable Food Systems
Two Pre-Requisites for Semester in Detroit Students – Fall 2008
Note: ideally, all students who apply to Semester in Detroit for winter 2009 will fulfill the two prerequisites below. However, if you have an irreconcilable scheduling conflict, we will work with you to come up with an alternative plan for meeting them. Do not let these prerequisites stand in the way of applying for the program.
- SOC 495.003: The History and Future of Detroit (1 credit) Taught by Sociology faculty member, Reynolds Farley, this mini-course will meet in November, 2009. To register for this class, you will need to go in-person to the Registrar’s office with a photo ID.
- Participation in the Ginsberg Center’s workshop series: Learning from the Community. Learning from the Community is a series of workshops that prepare you for working in a community organization. The series will occur on nine Tuesday evenings in fall semester. The full workshop schedule is available online. The UM staff contact for Learning from the Community is Dave Waterhouse at Ginsberg (hoohouse@umich.edu).
If you have any questions about the information included in this document, please contact Semester in Detroit Associate Director, Craig Regester (regester@umich.edu), or 313-505-5185.