Global Issues | Honors College

Exploring Culture Through Music and Dance

Wendy Guess

Fully Online

Music, dance and movement are a vivid interpretation of our history, identity, heritage and were used as a primary communication tool to explore meaning and purpose throughout the world and the centuries. Geography and health also influenced how they were shaped over the ages and their importance in human history, as well as how we might apply them for developing our future legacy as a human race, personally and professionally. This course explores the transformative power to create, connect and master the understanding of our world through the universal lens of movement and music.

Learn More

You Crit Like a Girl: The Unique Role of Women in Gaming, Entertainment, and Media

Connie Viamonte

Tues., 1:00P- 2:15P (HYBRID)

This course will investigate gender through the lens of modern media and entertainment.

Learn More

Foundations of Population Health

Noel Barengo

Mon. & Wed., 3:00PM-4:15PM

Foundations of Population Health introduces essential concepts and methods in population health, emphasizing how social, economic, and environmental factors shape health outcomes. Students explore health disparities, social determinants of health, and public health systems while building skills in interpreting epidemiological data and assessing community health needs. Grounded in frameworks like the Social Ecological Model, the course highlights how effective interventions address multiple levels of influence, from individual behavior to policy change. By the end, students are prepared to contribute to efforts that reduce inequities, promote health equity, and support healthier communities and societies.

Learn More

Ukraine 101

Malgorzata Durygin

Mon. and Wed., 11:00A– 12:15P

This course will provide students with an opportunity to survey Ukraine, investigating basic issues related to the Ukrainian language and cultural heritage including art, music, literature, and cuisine, and its significant contributors. Ukraine with its past and its current fight for freedom and democracy, as well as the significance of Ukraine as the center of the struggle for international values globally, and the present and future of the rule of law, democracy, and security for the larger world, and, in turn, to develop an ability of multiple viewpoint analysis of the world and become motivated to act and collaborate locally and globally.

Learn More

Graphic Voices

Gretchen Scharnagl

Tues., Thurs., 1:00PM - 2:15 PM

We will read and discuss graphic works ranging from the graphic novel, to outsider artist comics, and including coloring books, to discover the potential of this language to disseminate important stories and historic, social, psychological, artistic or scientific content.

Learn More

Keep Your Money Copy

Amy Desouvre

Wednesday, 9:30A-12:00P

This course will take an academic multidisciplinary approach to learning how to shop in an economic way. We will examine the basic elements of shopping history, the role that advertising and marketing play in social media as well as print, how to keep a minimalistic mind rather than becoming an over consumer, and finally the impact of internet, technology, and mobile apps and how to use them to your advantage.

Learn More

Corporate Diplomacy: The Role of Business in Promoting Peace and Sustainable Development

David Wernick

Every Other Wed., 11:00A-1:30P (Hybrid)

This course has been designed for students who intend to make an impact and make the world a better place using their own philanthropic resources.

Learn More

Innovation Nation: The Global Influence of Israeli Technology and Entrepreneurship

Andi Wolfer & Aaron Kaplowitz

Mon., 10:00A - 12:30P

Israel has built a reputation as an entrepreneurial powerhouse that exports industry-disrupting technologies all over the world. Visitors to the “Start-Up Nation” marvel at the innovations that have emerged from a country that once made the desert bloom.

Learn More

Music for the Soul: Rhythm, Resistance, and Revolution in American History

Trina Sanders

Online

This course will take you on a journey through the soundtrack of Black America, showing how music has always been more than art, rather the voice of power, pain, resistance, and revolution. From the fields of the South to the streets of Harlem, from Nina Simone to Kendrick Lamar, we’ll explore how Black music has shaped American identity and sparked social change.

Learn More

Science and the City

Tolga Erbora

Tuesdays and Thursdays, 11:00AM-12:15PM

This class is designed to offer an analytical eye to what has shaped present day city life and allow students to creatively model new initiatives that positively impact societies in the future. This course also invites students to use the information to create scenarios describing plausible cities in the present. We will analyze architecture, daily life, transportation, and planning in cities like Miami, including proactive and reactive styles such as resilience architecture, and investigate the implementation and consequences of these styles. Students will work together to create a unified "smart city" highlighting what is learned throughout the course.

Learn More

The Special Relationship: United Kingdom, the United States, the Common Law and the Foundations of Economic Liberty, Democracy, and Freedom

Anthony Rionda

Monday, 6:00P-8:30P

This interdisciplinary course focuses on our constant political cycle, a cycle that includes politics, government, communications, business interests, government funding, data analysis (specifically voter targeting, social media, and polling), law (constitutional, state and local, and administrative), and advocacy (how individuals, businesses, and associations lobby government for their interests). To engage fully in our political system, we must engage all the tools and skills at our disposal. We will focus on how decisions are made, how individuals can make a difference, and how important it is to know about: the process; communicating your thoughts and opinions; and how other fields interact with the political process (including the health industry, business, finance, etc.).

Learn More

Thou Shalt Not Steal: Wage Theft & Moral Philosophy

Jeanette Smith

Thurs. 1:00P - 2:15P (Hybrid)

For many low-wage or part-time workers, wage theft is an inevitable aspect of their working lives. Wage theft includes not being paid for overtime, being paid less than the minimum wage, or not being paid at all.

Learn More

Global Environmental Health and You

Brenda Luna

Thurs., 11:00A-12:15P (Certified Hybrid)

This course examines the relationships between human health and the environment. Students will explore the role of the natural and built environment and their impact on their health, as well as their local and global community’s health.

Learn More

Foundations of Population Health

Noel Barengo

Mon. & Wed., 3:00PM-4:15PM

The Foundations of Population Health course introduces the core principles, theories, and methods essential for understanding the health of populations. This course is designed to equip students with the knowledge and skills necessary to analyze and address the health needs of communities, focusing on the broader social, economic, and environmental factors that influence health outcomes. Students will explore how health is shaped not only by individual behaviors but also by the conditions in which people are born, live, work, and age.

Learn More

Film from the Developing World: Africa

Elizabeth Hanly

Fully Online

Extraordinary filmmaking has been accomplished, often in nearly impossible circumstances, across the Third World. What were the political and cultural circumstances in the country at the time the film was made? How difficult was it to make the film, in both political and economic terms? What is the film telling us about subtle as well as more obvious cultural concerns and realities? How was the film received in-country? How was it received internationally? How might it inform our understanding of these countries today? This course will look at films from throughout the continent of Africa.

Learn More