General Education Programme-School of General Education

General Education Programme

Pursuant to the aims of the GE Programme at HKBU, the BNBU GE Programme also aims to provide a foundation for each student’s development as a Whole Person. Students are required to complete 18 units of GE courses:

Course Level	Course Option/Category	Units
Level 1 Foundational Courses	Values and the Meaning of Life ^	3
	Quantitative Reasoning ^	3
	History and Civilization ^	3
Level 2 Interdisciplinary Thematic Courses	Culture, Creativity and Innovation ^, or	6
	Science, Technology and Society ^, or
	Sustainable Communities ^
Level 3 GE Capstone Courses	Service-Learning^, or	3
	Service Leadership Education^, or
	Experiential Learning^, or
	Interdisciplinary Independent Study ^
No. of Units Required		18

^This denotes a course category in which a list of courses is developed for students’ selection, offered by the other Faculties/School and SGE oversees and coordinates the course planning and development.

After completing the GE Programme, students are expected to be able to achieve the following intended learning outcomes:

PILO1	Use historical and cultural perspectives to gain insight into contemporary issues;
PILO2	Apply various value systems to decision-making in personal, professional, and social/political situations;
PILO3	Use data for purposes of analyses and to make recommendations for strategic implementation of policy on social, economic and business, cultural, and political affairs;
PILO4	Relate their majors with interdisciplinary thematic knowledge;
PILO5	Demonstrate connections among a variety of disciplines to gain insight into contemporary personal, professional, and community situations.

GE Courses

The GE Programme offers three levels of courses, from foundational courses to courses in themes, and a culminating capstone experience, building, step by step, a rich understanding of the world in which we live.

Level 1 Foundational Courses

In each category, a list of courses will be available for students’ selection. Students will be required to take one 3-unit course in each of the categories History and Civilization, Quantitative Reasoning, and Value and the Meaning of Life, for a total of 9 units.

The interdisciplinary courses in this level enable students to:

use historical and cultural perspectives to gain insight into contemporary issues;
apply various value systems to decision-making in personal, professional, and social/political situations;
recognize the value and limitations in the quantitative data encountered in daily life such as in the media or public reports, as well as to make use of quantitative data effectively to support sound reasoning.

Level 2 Interdisciplinary Thematic Courses

All the courses at Level 2 will be interdisciplinary and theme-based. In each of three themes: (i) Culture, Creativity and Innovation, (ii) Science, Technology and Society, and (iii) Sustainable Communities, a list of courses will be available for students’ selection. Students are required to take two 3-unit courses under any one or two of the interdisciplinary themes.

The interdisciplinary courses in this level enable students to:

relate their majors with interdisciplinary thematic knowledge and make connections among a variety of disciplines to gain insight into a wide range of issues pertinent to contemporary personal, professional, and community situations.
Promote BNBU’s ethos of Whole Person Education.

Level 3 GE Capstone Courses

A list of courses will be available for students’ selection. Students are required to take one 3-unit course under any one of the categories listed. Major Programmes could decide whether to count the 3-unit project/course towards their major, minor or concentration requirements, but not towards Free Electives. If a project/course is double-counted towards other requirements outside GE, students will have to take other course(s) to make up the three units to fulfil their GE Programme requirements or for graduation.

The interdisciplinary GE Capstone courses and independent studies enable students to:

synthesize knowledge from various disciplines to provide innovative solutions to solve a societal or global problem;
value the importance of working as a team for the common good;
show what has been learnt in the classroom and experiential environments as it applies to addressing an important issue faced by local, regional, and the global community.

List of courses in each category

General Education (Level 1) - Values and the Meaning of Life