The Core Curriculum
The Core Curriculum is a set of general education requirements that apply to all undergraduate students at Santa Clara University. Santa Clara’s Core Curriculum explicitly integrates three traditions of higher education: Catholic, Jesuit, and University values. Reflecting these traditions, the Core Curriculum provides every undergraduate with the common learning needed to become leaders of competence, conscience, and compassion.
The distinctiveness of a Santa Clara education emerges in the Core Curriculum, both in its sense of purpose rooted in the University’s traditions and in its commitment to a breadth of learning for the 21st century that complements and supports all majors. The Core Curriculum opens students to the study and practice of the arts, humanities, mathematics, technology, natural sciences, and social sciences. It educates students for interdisciplinary understanding and ethically informed participation in civic life.
Opportunities for experiential learning foster the development of compassion and attention to the ways human suffering can be alleviated. Reflecting the University’s founding mission, the Core Curriculum includes a disciplined and critical reflection on the religious dimensions of human existence. In addition, because the Core Curriculum continually highlights the critical and compelling questions facing individuals and communities, the Core Curriculum supports students both in making professional career choices and in discerning their larger vocation—their life’s purpose in the world.
Learning Goals: What will students learn in the Core Curriculum?
Because a liberal education in the Jesuit tradition is oriented toward particular ends, the Core Curriculum affirms a set of central learning goals. These goals are divided among three broad categories: Knowledge, Habits of Mind and Heart, and Engagement with the World.
Knowledge
To be prepared for well-informed engagement in society, students must comprehend the forces that have shaped the world they have inherited and the ways the world is interpreted and understood. They must also understand how they might transform the world for the better. The Core Curriculum deepens students’ knowledge of the ideas and ways of knowing that emerge from the arts, humanities, and natural and social sciences.
Global Cultures: The intertwined development of global ideas, institutions, religions, and cultures
Arts and Humanities: The production, interpretation, and social influence of the fine and performing arts, history, languages, literatures, philosophy, and religion
Scientific Inquiry: The principles of scientific inquiry and how they are applied in the natural and social sciences
Science and Technology: The formative influences, dynamics, social impacts, and ethical consequences of scientific and technological development
Diversity: Diverse human experiences, identities, and cultures within local and global societies, especially as formed by relations of power and privilege
Civic Life: The roles, rights, and responsibilities of citizens and institutions in societies and in the world
Habits of Mind and Heart
To contribute to a rapidly changing, complex, and interdependent world, students must develop ways of thinking, feeling, and acting that allow them to educate themselves for the rest of their lives with passion and purpose. By attending to the cognitive and affective dimensions of human experience, the Core Curriculum enables students to think more deeply, imagine more freely, and communicate more clearly.
Critical Thinking: The ability to identify, reflect upon, evaluate, integrate, and apply different types of information and knowledge to form independent judgments
Mathematics and Quantitative Reasoning: Analytical and logical thinking and the habit of drawing conclusions based on quantitative information
Complexity: An approach to understanding the world that appreciates ambiguity and nuance as well as clarity and precision
Ethical Reasoning: Drawing on ethical traditions to assess the consequences of individual and institutional decisions
Religious Reflection: Questioning and clarifying beliefs through critical inquiry into faith and the religious dimensions of human existence
Communication: Interacting effectively with different audiences, especially through writing, speech, and a second language
Engagement with the World
To engage with the world in meaningful ways, students need opportunities to explore and refine self-knowledge in relation to others. The Core Curriculum enhances students’ understanding of the integrity of their own lives and the dignity inherent in the lives of others, especially the impoverished, suffering, and marginalized.
Perspective: Seeking out the experience of different cultures and people, striving to view the world through their eyes
Collaboration: The capacity to collaborate intellectually and creatively with diverse people
Social Justice: Developing a disciplined sensibility toward the causes of human suffering and misery, and a sense of responsibility for addressing them
Civic Engagement: Addressing major contemporary social issues, including environmental sustainability and peaceful resolution of conflict, by participating actively as an informed citizen of society and the world
Students have multiple opportunities to encounter, practice, and master each learning goal. In addition, specific learning objectives for each area of the Core Curriculum have been developed by faculty Core Curriculum committees. These learning objectives, posted on the Core Curriculum website, describe the knowledge, skills, and values students will be able to demonstrate after completing the courses in the Core Curriculum.
Structure of the Core Curriculum
The structure of the Core features three phases designed to foster developmental learning and curricular coherence. The first phase, Foundations, consists of courses normally taken in the first year, introducing students to the processes and expectations for university-level education:
- Critical Thinking & Writing 1 and 2
- Cultures & Ideas 1 and 2
- Mathematics
- Religion, Theology & Culture 1
- Second Language (proficiency level required varies by major)
The second phase, Explorations, offers students the opportunity to choose among courses that will expand and deepen their understanding of a broad range of subject areas needed for effective participation in contemporary life as well as satisfy requirements in students’ majors. Explorations requirements:
- Arts
- Civic Engagement
- Cultures & Ideas 3
- Diversity: U.S. Perspectives
- Ethics
- Natural Science
- Religion, Theology & Culture 2
- Religion, Theology & Culture 3
- Science, Technology & Society
- Social Science
Students in the College of Arts and Sciences and the Leavey School of Business satisfy their Core Foundations and Explorations requirements with one course per Core area (except Second Language, which may require more than one course). School of Engineering students may satisfy more than one Core requirement with a single course when the course has been approved for both Core areas. Students who double major across schools/colleges must complete the Core requirements for each of their programs.
The third phase, Integrations, consists of these requirements:
- Advanced Writing
- Experiential Learning for Social Justice
- Pathways
These Core components are often embedded in courses students take to fulfill other requirements. These courses offer students the opportunity to examine the connections between courses in different disciplines, between the classroom and the wider community, and between their coursework and the professions.
Student progress through the Core Curriculum is not strictly sequential, from Foundations through Explorations to Integrations. While some courses (e.g., Critical Thinking & Writing 1 and 2; Cultures & Ideas 1 and 2; and Religion, Theology & Culture 1, 2, and 3) must be taken in sequence, all students have the opportunity to discover other sequences that are best for their individual undergraduate experience while engaging in coursework designed to address the shared set of learning objectives for each component of the Core Curriculum.
The Core Curriculum website provides more detailed information about each component of the Core Curriculum, the learning goals and objectives associated with each component, the Core policies, and the courses from which students may choose. Students are encouraged to check their Academic Progress tab in Workday regularly to track their progress in the Core Curriculum and other academic requirements.
The Core Curriculum and the College of Arts and Sciences
Students in the College of Arts and Sciences should consult Chapter 3 for the requirements for their majors. The Undergraduate Core Curriculum is designed to provide both a foundation and supplement to major requirements.
The Core Curriculum and the Leavey School of Business
Leavey School of Business requirements determine how students in the business school satisfy some Undergraduate Core Curriculum requirements—some Core Curriculum requirements are fulfilled with courses that also apply to the Business Core Curriculum. Students in the Leavey School of Business should consult Chapter 4 for a complete list of requirements for their majors and the school. The Core Curriculum website provides additional information.
The Core Curriculum and the School of Engineering
Students in the School of Engineering should consult Chapter 5 for a complete list of requirements for their majors and the school. The Core Curriculum website provides additional information for how engineering students complete their Core requirements.
Core Requirements for First-Year and Transfer Students
All students must satisfy the following Core requirements through Santa Clara University (on campus, in-person; online through an SCU summer course; or through an approved SCU Global Learning program): Civic Engagement; Science, Technology & Society; Religion, Theology & Culture; Advanced Writing; Experiential Learning for Social Justice; and Pathways. For some Core requirements, it is possible for students to earn credit by taking Advanced Placement (AP) or International Baccalaureate (IB) courses prior to entering SCU (see Chapter 8 of this bulletin), or by completing college-level courses at another accredited institution.
There are different Core requirements for (1) students admitted as first-year students, (2) transfer students with fewer than 44 transferable units, and (3) transfer students with 44 or more transferable units. For these definitions, transferable units do not include any AP or IB test credit.
Students admitted as first-year students
- Must satisfy Critical Thinking & Writing 1 and 2, Cultures & Ideas 1 and 2 with courses completed at Santa Clara University.
- Must take all three Religion, Theology & Culture courses in sequential order.
- Must declare their Pathway by the end of their second year. All majors in the College of Arts & Sciences and Leavey School of Business must complete four Pathway courses (at least 16 units). All engineering majors must complete three Pathway courses (at least 12 units).
Transfer students with fewer than 44 transferable units
- Encouraged to complete Critical Thinking & Writing 1 and 2, and Cultures & Ideas 1 and 2 before their first quarter at Santa Clara. Information about possible substitutions is available from the Office of the Registrar.
- Those with incomplete CTW or C&I sequences must take missing courses in the Critical Thinking & Writing 1 and 2 sequence and/or in the Cultures & Ideas 1 and 2 sequence.
- Must take all three Religion, Theology & Culture courses in sequential order.
- Must declare their Pathway by the end of their third quarter at SCU. All majors in the College of Arts & Sciences and Leavey School of Business must complete four Pathway courses (at least 16 units). All engineering majors must complete three Pathway courses (at least 12 units).
Transfer students with 44 or more transferable units
- Encouraged to complete Critical Thinking & Writing 1 and 2, and Cultures & Ideas 1 and 2 before their first quarter at Santa Clara. Information about possible substitutions is available from the Office of the Registrar.
- Those who have completed the first course in the sequence, will complete the sequence with an advanced course (either Cultures & Ideas 3 or Advanced Writing, depending on the sequence).
- Must complete two courses from the Religion, Theology & Culture sequence in any order.
- Must declare their Pathway by the end of their third quarter at SCU and complete three Pathway courses (at least 12 units).
Transfer Credit and the Core
Transfer credit for coursework completed at other colleges and universities requires approval from the Office of the Registrar and the Core Director. Students must earn a grade of “C” or better in a course for transfer credit to be granted. Courses taken on a pass/no pass or credit/no credit basis are not accepted for transfer credit. Grades for units earned at other institutions are not included in a student’s Santa Clara academic history or in the calculation of the SCU grade point average. Students who transfer to SCU should consult chapters 7 and 8 of this bulletin, as well as the chapter(s) relevant to their school or college.
After enrolling at SCU, students can receive Core credit for coursework completed at other colleges and universities for up to 10 quarter units, subject to the limitation that no more than half of the total number of quarter units required for a SCU degree can be earned at another institution.