Recommended Undergraduate Classes

In your college years, you should take classes to increase both your general knowledge (breadth) and your knowledge about a particular academic field (depth). I believe that there is enough time to take many classes in both the breadth and depth groups. I've been out of college for more than a decade, and I still think about the classes I took and didn't take. Here, then, are my recommendations for the breadth courses.

Literature, Philosophy, Language, and Linguistics.
--A year of English literature courses, surveying ancient to modern literature.
--One Introduction to Western Philosophy course.
--One Principles of Critical Reasoning or Principles of Argumentation course (a philosophy or speech course).
--A year of a foreign language, unless you are fluent in a second language.
--One Introduction to Linguistics course.

Visual and Musical Arts.
--One Introduction to Art History course.
--One Music Appreciation course or Introduction to Musical Theory course.

Social Sciences
--A year of European History or World History courses, surveying ancient to modern history, unless you've learned European History or World History well in high school.
--A year of American History courses, surveying colonial to modern history, unless you've learned American History well in high school.
--One East Asian History survey course.
--One Introduction to American Politics course.
--One introductory course in psychology, sociology, communication studies, or anthropology.
--One Introduction to Economics course (or maybe a Macroeconomics course and a Microeconomics course).
--One Abnormal Psychology course.
--One Introduction to Statistics course.

Life Sciences, Physical Sciences, and Mathematics.
--One Introduction to Human Anatomy course.
--One Introduction to Biology course, unless you've completed a year of biology in high school.
--One introductory course in Life Sciences (other than Biology), Earth & Space Sciences, or Atmospheric Sciences.
--One Introduction to Chemistry course, unless you've completed a year of chemistry in high school.
--One Introduction to Physics course, unless you've completed a year of physics in high school.
--One year of mathematics, unless you've compeleted a year of calculus in high school.

About the Author

Andrea Jussim is an experienced writer with experience in teaching and research. She entered a prestigious 5-year Ph.D. program immediately after completing her undergraduate studies, but left with an M.A. and her sanity two years later.

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