At the core of this component is a series of courses, several of them interdisciplinary, called Cultural Foundations.
Students complete a second writing course in their first year.
In addition, College Mathematics, Computational Skills, and Oral Communication are recommended for freshmen. In the sophomore year , students study American history and culture from two different perspectives. In The American Experience , they investigate American history from the viewpoint of racial and ethnic pluralism. In American Dilemmas , they employ the methods of economics, political science and other social sciences as they investigate the problems facing American society and as they formulate solutions to those problems. The sophomore year is an appropriate time to study the natural sciences, first in depth in a science of the student's choice and then in breadth in Science in Perspective.