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Why Interdisciplinarity in Higher Ed?
Interdisciplinary education can help students develop 21st century skills, and a wide range of cross-cutting professional skills. It enables students to look at the world through multiple lenses; synthesize disciplines to better understand phenomena; identify and connect interdependencies among disciplines or topics; and understand larger systems in which individual disciplines exist (Cotantino et al., 2010; Cowden & Santiago, 2016; Styron, 2013), where “knowledge […] is not applied in bits and pieces but in an integrated fashion” (Summers, 2005, p.627).
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Typology of Interdisciplinarity
“Interdisciplinary” refers to any type of activities that traverse the boundaries of traditional disciplines. We consider interdisciplinarity being an umbrella term for three main types, including cross-disciplinary education, multi-disciplinary education, and transdisciplinary education.
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Suggested Readings
Aldrich, J. H. (2014). Interdisciplinarity : its role in a discipline-based academy. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Ashby, I., & Exter, M. (2018). Designing for interdisciplinarity in higher education: Considerations for Instructional Designers. TechTrends. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11528-018-0352-z
Ashby, I., Caskurlu, S., & Exter, M. (2018). Evolving roles of faculty at an emerging hybrid competency-based transdisciplinary program. The Journal of Competency-Based Education, 3(1), e01059. https://doi.org/10.1002/cbe2.1059
Baker, W. D., & Däumer, E. (2015). Designing interdisciplinary instruction: exploring disciplinary and conceptual differences as a resource. Pedagogies, 10(1), 38–53. https://doi.org/10.1080/1554480X.2014.999776
Becher, T. (1994). The Significance of Disciplinary Differences. Studies in Higher Education, 19(2), 151–161. https://doi.org/10.1080/03075079412331382007
Becher, T., & Trowler, P. (2001). Academic tribes and territories : intellectual enquiry and the culture of disciplines (2nd ed.). Philadelphia, PA: Open University Press.
Holley, K. (2017). Interdisciplinary Curriculum and Learning in Higher Education. In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Education. https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190264093.013.138
Jacob, W. J. (2015). Interdisciplinary trends in higher education. Palgrave Communications, Vol. 1. https://doi.org/10.1057/palcomms.2015.1
Kandiko, C. B. (2012, July). Leadership and creativity in higher education: The role of interdisciplinarity. London Review of Education, 10, pp. 191–200. https://doi.org/10.1080/14748460.2012.691283
Klein, J. T. (2006). A Platform for a Shared Discourse of Interdisciplinary Education 1. Journal of Social Science Education © JSSE, 5(2), 10–18. Retrieved from www.jsse.org