Clark University Academics & Faculty
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The Academic Program
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Academic Program

A Clark education is unique in that it provides a high-quality liberal arts education with personal attention and advanced study opportunities, as captured in the three Clark signatures. Most students begin their Clark career with a first-year seminar, designed to help them develop the skills and habits of mind they will need to succeed at Clark. Clark has developed a unique program of liberal studies that fosters critical thinking skills and broadens perspectives. Because they can choose among many different courses, students can take courses that interest them and, at the same time, satisfy their broad liberal arts requirements.

By the spring of sophomore year, students declare a major in which they develop depth and expertise. The University offers 31 majors, 30 minors and ten interdisciplinary concentrations, which can be combined to match individual interests and academic goals. Once students choose a major, their academic department becomes their intellectual "home," where they are able to work closely with faculty on research and other creative projects. As students acquire increasing depth and sophistication in a field of their choosing, they are able to take advantage of Clark's wide array of courses to construct an individualized program of study suited to their interests and career goals. In many fields, students have the opportunity to enter an honors program or accelerate to an advanced degree.

First-Year Seminars

First-year seminars allow students to explore, in depth, various issues and subjects. First-year seminars focus on helping students develop core academic skills that will enhance success in later Clark courses: reading, writing, speaking, thinking, and debating, all at the college level of intellectual sophistication. Seminars are intensive, stimulating, and challenging, and are limited to no more than 16 students each. The professor who teaches each first-year seminar also serves as academic advisor to the students in the seminar until they declare a major. Thus, students who enroll in first-year seminars start their Clark careers by developing a close relationship with both a professor and a small group of students who share at least one intellectual interest. All first-year seminars fill a Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) requirement.

First-year seminars change from year to year. As an example, we expect to offer the following seminars in Fall 2008.

Fall 2008

ARTH158: Art and the City of Worcester

BIOL100: Introductory Biology/First-Year Research Seminar In Fungal Molecular Ecology

CHEM042 Science in Science Fiction

CHEM103 Accelerated Introductory Chemistry/Lecture, Laboratory

CLAS050/HIST050 Jesus, History and the Apocalypse

CMLT129 Revolution in Hispanic Culture

COMM050 Communication & Culture in Main South

CSCI100 Think Like Computers

CSCI110 Diving Into Research

ECON100 Economics of Environmental Regulation

ENG104 To The Woods: Walden Today

ENG118 Webs and Labyrinths: Imagining Globalization in Art and Literature

ENG122 Terror of the Gothic

ENG131 Border Crossings: Narratives of Travel, Exile, and Immigration

ENG147 Mythology

FREN108 Paris and 20th Century Artistic Movements: Art, Theater, and Cinema

GEOG090/GES090 Native Americans and Natural Resources

GOVT095 Transnationalism: Individuals, Networks and Global Politics

HIST039 At Home in 19th-Century America: Domesticity and American Culture

HIST042 Nazi Germany

IDCE011/MGMT011 Making a Difference 

MATH110 Diving Into Research: Rigidity and Geometry

MGMT020 Strikes in America

PHIL100 The Good Life

PHIL104 The AIDS Pandemic

PHIL109  David Hume and his Critics: Skepticism vs. Belief

PSYC190 Taking Sides: Hot Debates in Developmental Psychology

PSYC193 Discourse, Self and Feeling

SOC085 The Corporate Planet

SOC095 Why Marry?

TA153 Modern Drama

 



 

The Academic Program
Program of Liberal Studies
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