It is well established by decades of research that students learn course content by having frequent opportunities to write and speak about it. UNCC needs to apply insights generated by our Communication Across the Curriculum program (https://cxc.uncc.edu/) to revise teaching approaches to Gen. Ed. 

Teaching and learning should include frequent low-stakes “writing-to-learn” and “speaking-to-learn” assignments in every Gen. Ed. course.

Not only will this support learning course content, but it will also improve students’ writing and speaking abilities across the disciplines. 

Everyone can agree that our students ought to write and speak more effectively, with the ability to adjust for purpose and audience in a variety of contexts, both in and out of the classroom. Gen. Ed. ought to be the centerpiece of this effort.