The Department of General Education plays a vital role in shaping students’ knowledge, skills, and attitudes by offering courses that promote lifelong learning, critical thinking, communication, research, innovation, and entrepreneurship. The department’s objectives and course offerings are closely aligned with the goals and competency outcomes of all health and medical programs at the university. [Read More]
General Education
OVERVIEW
HOD'S MESSAGE
Welcome to the General Education Department! Our goal is to equip you with the essential skills and knowledge needed to excel in your academic journey and future careers in healthcare. Through our diverse curriculum, we emphasize critical thinking, effective communication, research skills, and a lifelong learning mindset to prepare you for success. [Read More]
The following goals of general education speak for the breadth, integration, and scaffolding of knowledge, skills, and attitudes that are embedded in the purpose statement of the institute. All these goals are linked to the outcome competences of all health professions education programs at GMU (Medical expertise, knowledge for practice, life-long learning, teamwork, communication, research and innovations, inter-professional education and above all including new areas such as entrepreneurship). The goals of general education shall:
- Focus on the essential attitudes and behaviors that promote reflection and encourage life-long learning, wellness, and engagement with ideas, issues, and new experiences.
- Foster the development of critical thinking; the need to continually update their knowledge and translate the advances in medicine in the delivery of healthcare practice to the benefit of the health of the community; and a capacity for attaining individual perspective on one’s own life through self-examination and the study of others.
- Engage students in activities that strengthen their ability to read, write, speak, listen, and think effectively using the English language as the primary medium of instruction and communication in their professional practice.
- Provide students with opportunities to examine and reflect upon moral and ethical problems and issues.
- Enable students to use technology in order to access and manipulate information competently.
- Enable students to understand and appreciate the ways social and cultural differences and similarities structure human experiences and knowledge in Islamic studies, history and culture and the social or behavioral sciences. As an important aspect of general education, students shall understand multicultural dimensions of the world in which we live, especially the experiences of people of Arabic descent.
- Emphasize study in breadth and encourage students to explore the ways scientific inquiry in the health sciences can provide solution to the issues of health and promote wellness in their own lives and to render service to the community that they will serve in the practice of their professions after graduation.
- Initiate students in innovation process, enable them with basic entrepreneurship skills and make them understand the concepts of sustainability in modern word in the field of their future profession.
Upon completion of the General Education courses at GMU, the student will be able to:
- Communicate competently through the various written and oral formats.
- Evaluate and use information effectively and responsibly
- Apply critical thinking to make informed and logical judgments.
- Use quantitative methods for critical assessment of data and problem- solving.
- Demonstrate skill in the use of current information technology.
- Relate themselves to the local and global context.
- Practice strong values of ethical conduct and social responsibilities.
- Develop collaboration in diverse team settings by applying innovation and entrepreneurship skills in sustainable professional environment.
General Education Program for undergraduate degrees is updated according to latest Standards 2019 updated with the instruction from CAA June 13th, 2024, and completely compliant with CAA recommendations. The list of courses and credit hours identified as General Education courses for GMU undergraduate programs are as follows:
| Course Code | Course Title | Credit Hours | CAA standards 2019
Updated from CAA 13th June 2024 |
|||
| CH | LH | NLH | mandatory | Other GE | ||
| EMS 101 | Emirati Studies | 3 | 3 | – | √ | |
| ENG 101 | English Language | 3 | 3 | – | √ | |
| EIS 101 | Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Sustainability | 2 | 1 | 1 | √ | |
| BSE 101 | Behavioral Sciences and Ethics | 3 | 3 | – | √ | |
| ITH 101 | Information Technology for Healthcare Professionals | 2 | 1 | 1 | √ | |
| BIS 101 | Biostatistics | 3 | 2 | 1 | √ | |
| Variable | Natural Sciences | 3 | 3 | – | √ | |
| Semester Total | 19 | 16 | 3 | status: complete | ||
CH – Credit Hours, LH – Lecture Hours, NLH – Non-Lecture Hours; Natural sciences are customized and delivered by each College
EMS 101 Emirati Studies
This course provides an in-depth exploration of the most significant aspects of the United Arab Emirates, offering students insights into the features of Emirati society. It covers economic and social development, affirming the nation’s core values and heritage, and includes studies in key areas such as history, geography, internal and external policies, social systems, human development, and demographics. The course emphasizes the role of Emirati citizens in development, with particular attention to women’s empowerment and their societal contributions. Additionally, it highlights the country’s focus on sustainable energy, economic advancements, and development indicators, alongside its global competitiveness. Furthermore, the course addresses future strategic development plans and the challenges they entail, recognizing the UAE’s pioneering role on the international stage and its progress in global development and competitiveness indicators. It offers a detailed analysis of the social aspects of Emirati society, focusing on its unique culture, community dynamics, and the interplay of multiethnicity and cultural diversity, underpinned by the values of tolerance and indigenous traditions. By the end of the course, students will have developed an awareness of multiculturalism and the ability to relate their understanding to a global context.
ENG 101 English Language
The course provides an intensive instruction in the communication process focusing on the organization of ideas in well-developed expository and argumentative essays with emphasis on developing vocabulary and writing examination answers. In the process the students will be able to document their learning experiences effectively. This course prepares students to be proficient in spoken and written English. It is intended to improve way of the use of the English language as a basic tool for professional communications.
EIS 101 Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Sustainability
This course aims to initiate final year students in innovation process, enable them with basic entrepreneurship skills and make them understand the concepts of sustainability in modern world in the field of their future profession. Course is designed in 3 parts in order to explain main principles of entrepreneurial process; to link them with concept of innovation and to engage in sustainability leadership to affect positive societal change. For future medical professionals this course has to ensure ability of medical decision making properly balanced between professional, ethical approaches on one side and finance and business on the other side.
BSE 101 Behavioral Sciences and Ethics
The course is designed to give an overview of the main topics in behavioral sciences and Ethics including biological basis of behavior, mental processes, sensation and perception, learning, motivation, intelligence, human development, personality and universal ethical principles. The objective of the course is to enable the student to understand and apply the knowledge, skills and attitude developed in this course to communicate effectively. Students will learn and practice strong values, ethical conduct and social responsibilities, especially personal, academic and professional integrity while developing collaboration in diverse team settings. Students will be trained to display sensitivity to cultural, psychosocial and ethical issues.
ITH 101 Information Technology for Healthcare Professionals
This course aims to develop effective literature search, scientific writing and presentation skills. It intends to enable the students to understand the various types of scientific literature available, perform an effective literature search, write a review on a scientific topic, prepare effective tables and graphs and present effective oral and poster presentations. The student will be made aware about plagiarism as well. Student will be able to demonstrate skills in searching a topic using various learning resources and databases (information literacy skills).
BIS 101 Biostatistics
This course presents biostatistics related to health and medical problem solving in analytical way. This course introduces the student to the principles of statistics and concept of clinical trial design and analysis. Student will be able to explain the concept of variables, data description; probability and concepts of descriptive and inferential statistics; and to demonstrate basic knowledge of application data analyses in applied health sciences. Student will be able to make decision about appropriate use of descriptive and inferential statistics according to the type of data and study design for answering a particular research question. This is foundation and prerequisite for courses which will be taken later on, such are research and evidence-based medicine.
Natural Sciences
Depending on natural science course description will be provided in details. All natural sciences’ courses have common goals to train student to identify, collect, organize, analyze, evaluate and use scientific information effectively and responsibly in the context of their profession. Students will apply critical thinking to make informed and logical judgments. While completion of natural science course student will be able to show comprehension and use of quantitative and qualitative ideas and methods for critical assessment of the data and effective problem-solving.