Spring 2025
8-week asynchronous online / 3 credits Comm-B

This three-credit Comm-B course explores the meaning and value of your liberal arts and sciences education for careers in the global, technological, and multicultural workplace of the 21st century -- no matter what your major.

Through a series of individual and collaborative research and communication assignments, you will learn to critically analyze the career and education implications of a diverse and digital workplace, and to critically reflect on your own strengths and values as you prepare to connect your college work with lifelong career success.

All course information, learning content, and activities are available by selecting Modules on the course navigation menu.

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Level: Elementary
Gen-Ed: Fulfills Comm-B requirement
Breadth: Social Science (S)
Requisites: Must have satisfied Comm-A requirement. Limited to UW-Madison Online students.
Instruction mode: Asynchronous online
Lecture: Recorded for viewing online
Discussion: Asynchronous online text discussion
Credits: Three credits

Introductory Screencast

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Syllabus

Schedule OUD - 24_25_Spring.png

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How does this course work?

This eight-week asynchronous online version of INTER-LS 215 is taught with a mix of activities each week:

Recorded lectures viewable on Canvas. Our lectures and supplemental videos are all prerecorded and available for asynchronous viewing. Expect about an hour total of lecture video each week.
Reading assignments downloadable from Canvas. Expect from 3-5 different article-length readings each week. (While we ask you to purchase two textbooks, key sections of those textbooks are also downloadable here.)
Assignments uploaded to Canvas. Each week, students must complete several different assignments, uploading them to Canvas in order to prepare for text discussion participation. For example:
- Career assignments focus on reflection, speaking, and writing skills useful to your career development.
- Article reflections are based on various articles on contemporary issues that students read each week.
- Speech assignments involve either a more thorough analysis of one of the week's issue articles, or on an article that you find yourself related to your career field.
Asynchronous text discussions posted to Canvas. Discussions are held via text and are open all week long. During most weeks, you'll use the text discussion work through ideas and questions about the scholarly articles for the week -- viewing a prepared student speech for each article and another student discussing an outside article they found.
Essay writing assignments uploaded to Canvas. Finally, on most weeks, there is an assignment related to the four-page academic essay you will write in this course. You will work step-by-step to construct this essay, from initial topic and thesis exploration through an outline, first draft, peer review, and final draft.

There is an optional take-home, open-book final essay exam for this course that serves as extra credit.

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Learning Outcomes

Understand, evaluate, and communicate arguments about the nature of work in contemporary global, digital, and multicultural society, with respect to a specific target career community.
Develop and communicate a compelling personal career narrative about your path through a liberal arts and sciences education, with respect to a specific target career community.

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Textbooks

We use several textbooks for the course. The first two are printed books available at the University Bookstore and also at online retailers (they should cost about $20 each):

Don Clifton, Clifton Strengths for Students (2017). This book has a unique code in it that allows you to take an online strengths assessment for one of your assignments. If you do not have a copy of this book, or if you purchase this book as a used copy, you will need to pay an extra fee to directly purchase access to the online assessment.
Wayne C. Booth et al., The Craft of Research, 4th ed. (2016). This guide to researching and writing scholarly papers of any length -- from the four-page essays we practice in this class to an undergraduate research thesis of fifty-pages -- is a classic resource that you can use all throughout your college career and beyond.

The last two textbooks are freely available online:

Greg Downey, Working Toward Success: Building a Career in the Liberal Arts and Sciences (2019). This 200-page PDF textbook is freely available to download chapter-by-chapter.

UW-Madison Writer's Handbook . This free online resource, developed here at UW-Madison, contains valuable guidance on improving your writing.

There is also one recommended (optional) textbook:

Katharine Brooks, You Majored in What? Designing Your Path from College to Career (2017). This book is a comprehensive guide to the job search process, written by an expert in career advising and targeted to liberal arts and sciences university students. It should remain useful to you throughout your time at UW-Madison and beyond.

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Scholarly Articles

In this course we read and reflect on several articles, all available for download below:

Speaking guide

Sullivan, Jay. "See it. Save it. Say it. Delivering from notes and visuals," from Simply Said: Communicating Better at Work and Beyond. John Wiley & Sons, 2016.

Writing guide

Richard Marius, "Kinds of writing" in A Writer's Companion, 3rd ed. (1995).

Scholarly articles on technology and diversity/inclusion issues

Technology and Social Networking
- Gawande, A. (2018, November 12). The Upgrade: Why Doctors Hate Their Computers. The New Yorker, 29.
- Seabrook, J. (2021, February 1). Office space: The post-pandemic future of open-plan work. The New Yorker.
Algorithms and Humans
- Dean, J. (2022). A Golden Decade of Deep Learning: Computing Systems & Applications. Daedalus, 151(2), 58–74.
- Huge “foundation models” are turbo-charging AI progress. (2022, June 11). The Economist.

Workplace Diversity and Inclusivity
- John Palfrey, “The case for diversity,” in Safe Spaces, Brave Spaces: Diversity and Free Expression in Education (MIT Press, 2017).
- Warikoo, N. (2016). Making sense of race. In The Diversity Bargain. University of Chicago Press.
Gender Equity
- Claire Cain Miller, "Women did everything right. Then work got 'greedy,'" The New York Times (April 26, 2019).
- Twine, F. W. (2018). Technology’s Invisible Women: Black Geek Girls in Silicon Valley and the Failure of Diversity Initiatives. International Journal of Critical Diversity Studies, 1(1), 58–79.
Algorithms and Bias in Hiring
- Lauren A. Rivera, “Entering the elite,” chapter 1 in Pedigree: How Elite Students Get Elite Jobs (Princeton Univ. Press, 2015).
- Dattner, B., Chamorro-Premuzic, T., Buchband, R., & Schettler, L. (2019, April 25). The Legal and Ethical Implications of Using AI in Hiring. Harvard Business Review.
Concluding Reflections

- Robin J. Ely and David A. Thomas, "Getting serious about diversity," Harvard Business Review (Nov-Dec 2020).
- Bosses say they want to tackle racial injustice. (2020, June 11). The Economist.

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Grading policies

Final grading scale. Semester grades are computed out of 100 possible points on the standard A-F scale:

90-100 = A
85-89 = AB
80-84 = B
75-79 = BC
70-74 = C
60-69 = D
0-59 = F

Late assignments. You do not need to ask your instructor for permission to turn in a late assignment; late assignments will be accepted up to one week after the due date for 50% credit. After one week, all late assignments revert to zeros.
Extra credit. The optional, take-home, open-book final exam allows you to add up to 5 points, or 5%, to your final grade.
Multiple absences, multiple missed assignments, or lack of communication. If you miss participating in the class for a week, without letting your instructor know why, we will email you out of concern for your well-being. If you do not respond to us with an explanation and a plan to get back on track, we will ask the Dean of Students office to reach out to you to offer help.
Emergency or crisis situations that require extra consideration. Please contact us if you encounter an emergency or crisis situation during the semester that would require special accommodations for attendance or assignments beyond our normal policy above.

You will only get out of this course what you put into it. Students tend to earn high grades in this course, by attending all course meetings and completing all of the assignments on time and with integrity. And students who keep up on attendance and assignments tell us consistently that they achieve their learning outcomes in this course. Many of the assignments cover tasks like reflecting on your experiences, putting together a resume, and setting up a LinkedIn site, which you'll have to do anyway -- so why not get some guidance and credit along the way?

It is our responsibility -- and pleasure -- to help you through these tasks to achieve your learning goals.

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Supporting Your Academic Success

If you find yourself needing additional support, please look through the support resources below to help you be successful.

Academic Support : See all of your options for tutoring, writing help, study skills assistance, and more in one place.
McBurney Disability Resource Center - Apply for Accommodations
Netiquette Guidelines : Review the set of guidelines for online behavior.
UW Libraries : Make an appointment, request materials for in-person pickup, or access tons of resources online.
Writing Center Writer’s Handbook: Citation style guidelines and examples, writing style guides, and more!

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Testimonials

I want to tell you how I will be graduating in May and received a job offer all the way back in October to work at Epic starting in June. I feel that a big reason I got the job was not only because of the interview techniques I used that I have already mentioned, but also because of the networking I did. Before even applying for the job at the job fair in the Fall, I used LinkedIn to search for UW alumni who work at Epic (as you showed us), reached out to them to see if I could speak with them, conducted informational interviews with them, and then used what I learned in speaking with these current Epic employees to improve and tailor my responses during my phone and onsite interviews. I have no doubt that both the interview techniques I learned in your class as well as the ability to use informational interviews and network with others played a critical role in me getting hired!

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