Knox College Moodle

This course will review models, etiology, assessment, and intervention for various developmental and acquired disabilities. This course is organized through a lifespan developmental approach beginning with etiology diagnosis and moving through early intervention, special education, dating and sexuality, vocation, community involvement, and healthcare. Specific disabilities will be examined through a biopsychosocial lens. Autism spectrum disorder, AD/HD, intellectual disability, learning disabilities, traumatic brain injury, spinal cord injury, acquired blindness, and related conditions will be covered.

The transformation of sound into digital data has profoundly affected the creation, production and distribution of music. With the vast majority of music now mediated by some form of digitization, it has shaped even our most basic modes of listening. This course grapples with the implications of this technology, its history, and its broad range of uses and tools. In doing so, students will utilize the Knox Electronic Music Studio to explore the foundational techniques of audio production, synthesis, sampling, podcasting, film scoring, and interactive software development.

Many of us are attracted to science because of the wonder of discovery and the (supposed) purity of the pursuit of knowledge. In this course we will wrestle with some of challenging questions that arise in the practice of science.

Our technological prowess has opened vistas for humanity to dream bigger, or perhaps it has simply revealed the cosmically (comically?) short timeframe of human existence and hence led us to imagine new ways for that existence to end. Extinction or evolution, one way or the other humanity is poised for transition. Will climate change force us to colonize other planets? Will we merge with machines by adding cyborg implants or, more radically, uploading our minds into robotic bodies?

The fear of human extinction and the promise of radical salvation through technology intertwine in a religious worldview unique to the contemporary world. We will explore this worldview and discuss the political and social implications of transferring our religious impulses and hope of salvation into technological forecasting.