Courses offered by Stephen Ross are considered critical Cultural Theory courses in which students are challenged to develop their own dynamic individual critical consciousness through dialectical analysis and immanent ideological critique techniques of questioning premises behind practices, seeking to uncover 'self-interested' cultural determinants of what is typically considered 'common sense', 'common good', 'natural', 'status quo', 'taken for granted', 'bedrock reality', 'practical', 'functional', 'appropriate', 'preferable', and so on..... Via this, students are encouraged to consider, on their own terms, actions which will create optimum intersections of 'most good/least harm' and the challenges these actions and thought processes engender. While studying the principles and underlying motivations of some of our most powerful, credible, and authoritative cultural systems (worldviews, value hierarchies, epistemologies, cultural paradigms/myths), each student is encouraged to acknowledge and further create their own 'vernacular theory' vis a vis this established 'status quo' in order to gain the confidence and poise to risk not only questioning 'the way things are' but also further develop their own agency in order to offer viable alternatives to the status quo. Stephen Ross has been teaching in the School since 1990. His educational background includes advanced study in architecture theory, Comparative cultural and critical theory, International economics, and marketing. His professional background includes real estate investment and development management for the nation's largest independent shopping center company, Manager of international marketing with a 'Fortune 15' corporation, editor with one of nation's largest monthly magazines, and office building and industrial construction and engineering.