Interdisciplinary Liberal Arts Core Curriculum
While we don’t minimize the importance of specialized, professional education, we also believe that the general education component is vitally important for success in the modern world. What knowledge, skills, attitudes, and values should everyone who is college-educated have? How can you find or flourish in a career without finding the work that is suitable for you as a person? In this modern era, economical, political, and social revolution is the norm. Changes in science and technology seem exponential. New industries and economic and financial institutions emerge and shift fluidly around our flat world. Upheaval in the Middle East, explosive growth in East and South Asia, global climate change, biological breakthroughs—these challenges all have positive and negative implications. A diversified education is the best strategy to succeed in an emerging, changing future.
The interdisciplinary core curriculum is a coherent, two-year sequence of courses to build the perspective that modern students need. Core courses are organized by four divisions and complemented by four elective courses taught outside of our College and usually relevant to the student’s intended major.
The curriculum below was changed in 2008–2009, eliminating freshman natural science courses and adding a first semester freshman elective, effective fall 2009 for the class of CGS’11, BU’13.
|
Freshman
Semester 1 |
Freshman
Semester 2 |
Sophomore
Semester 1 |
Sophomore
Semester 2 |
|---|---|---|---|
| SS101 Social Science I Introduction to Historical Sociology and the Social Sciences Anthropology Sociology Economics Social Psychology |
SS102 Social Science II
Social Change and Modernization in the Western World |
SS201 Social Science III Social Change and Modernization in the Non-Western World: China and Russia History |
SS202 Social Science IV America’s Response to Aggression and Revolution: U.S. Foreign Policy since the 1930s Political Science |
| HU101 Humanities I Traditions in the Humanities: The Ancient World through the Renaissance Literature, with Film and Art History |
HU102 Humanities II Breaks with Tradition: The Enlightenment to the Present Literature, with Film and Art History |
HU201 Humanities III History of Western Ethical Philosophy: Plato to Nietzsche Philosophy, with Art, Film, and Literature |
HU202 Humanities IV History of 20th-C. Ethical Philosophy and Applied Ethics Philosophy, with Art, Film, and Literature |
| RH101 Rhetoric I
English Composition: |
RH102 Rhetoric II
English Composition: Argument and Research |
NS201 Natural Science I
Cosmology, Evolution, Biological Chemistry, Genetics |
NS202 Natural Science II Human and Global Ecology Climatology, Environmental Chemistry, Population Biology |
| Elective (in another college) |
Elective (in another college) |
Elective (in another college) |
Elective (in another college) |
| Capstone |
The Humanities courses look at the classic forms of literature, visual arts, and film and then follow the rise of the modern and postmodern sensibility. The history of ethical philosophy considers major philosophers who addressed the questions: What is the good life? How can we tell right from wrong? Why lead a virtuous life?
In Natural Science, students consider the history, epistemology, and societal context of the scientific revolutions that have shaped our understanding of the modern world. The key roles of Darwin and biology (e.g., genetics and ecology) are stressed.
The Rhetoric courses (persuasive writing, the college essay, and the research paper) tie it all together. It is universally acknowledged that the ability to think, articulate, argue, analyze, and create in writing is at the heart of a liberal arts college education and the key to success in every job, profession, and career.
In Social Science, students first learn social analysis methodologies (history, sociology, anthropology, economics, social psychology) and examine a traditional society. Then they turn to the origins of our contemporary world in centuries of revolutions and modernization leading to our familiar Western European Civilization. In the second year, rapid modernization and revolutions are studied in non-Western contexts—Russia, China, and American foreign policy and the response to terrorism.
CGS students take one elective each semester outside of the College, typically language, mathematics, or courses of special relevance to their intended majors.
Capstone is a CGS tradition in which groups of students work together to research social problems and then argue in writing and orally for a specific policy proposal to solve the problem.