Investigating a range of academic areas and approaches may help the student discover the field on which she or he wants to focus, contributes to his or her specialized study by putting it in a wider perspective, and expands intellectual horizons. In a system consistent with the curriculum's hallmarks of choice and flexibility, the faculty assign courses to distributional categories not by divisional or program location, but by content, that is, by intellectual focus and methodology. For this reason courses often fall into more than one category. A student is required to take at least one course from each category over four years. To ensure breadth of experience early in the four-year learning experience, four of the first five courses selected to fulfill the requirements must be outside the student's major.
Students have great flexibility in choosing the form of their projects.
Preparation for the Senior Project begins in the junior year with consultation with advisers, course work, and work in tutorials directed toward selecting a topic, choosing the form of the project, becoming competent in the analytical and research methods required by the topic and form, and, of course, studying the subject matter. Students in some programs design a Major Conference during their junior year. The Major Conference is intended to prepare the student for the Senior Project. The emphasis in the second semester is on work specific to the Senior Project. One course each semester of the student's final year is devoted to completing the Senior Project.