*University Core Curriculum

Mission and Outcomes of the RWU General Education Program

The RWU General Education program fosters inquisitive, reflective, and creative learners who use a breadth of knowledge and skills to enrich their personal, public and professional lives. Throughout this program, students will learn how to synthesize information from across their academic experience, to examine the world holistically, appreciate the diversity of their local and global communities, and participate in them effectively and ethically.

To ensure that our program produces such graduates, the RWU faculty asks students, across all four years, to:

1. Demonstrate knowledge of diverse human cultures, histories, arts, languages, literatures, and the physical environments on which these depend.
2. Communicate purposefully, ethically, and effectively in a variety of formats and situations including written, oral, and artistic.
3. Engage in self-reflection and ethical reasoning.
4. Synthesize knowledge and make connections within, across, and beyond disciplines.
5. Learn and employ the literacies and habits of mind that inform the work that we do: information literacy, artistic production and aesthetic appreciation, quantitative literacy, critical inquiry and analysis.

The CORE Curriculum at a Glance

Three CORE Competency Courses - one in mathematics and two in writing - prepare students to think abstractly and express their ideas clearly. Most students complete these courses during the first three semesters.

The Five-Course Interdisciplinary CORE is based on learning outcomes drawn from the traditional liberal arts: the sciences, history and politics, the social sciences, literature and philosophy, and the fine arts. In these courses students examine great ideas, historic milestones, and works of art; discover connections among different areas of knowledge and methods for gathering it; learn to reason logically, to sift through deception and cant, and to integrate what they know. Most students complete these five courses during the freshman and sophomore years. In addition to CORE 101-105, some disciplinary courses have been designated as meeting the Five-Course requirement and are listed under these requirements in Roger Central. All CORE courses must be completed at Roger Williams University.

The CORE Concentration involves a fifteen-credit exploration of one liberal arts discipline or interdisciplinary program unrelated to the major. This requirement ensures that students graduate with significant knowledge of at least two fields, that of the major and that of the CORE Concentration.

The CORE Interdisciplinary Senior Seminar or CISS unites studies in the liberal arts and sciences;  integrates knowledge; and involves sophisticated analysis, synthesis, and defense of original ideas. Taught by full-time faculty from across the university, CISS courses feature small class sizes and active student involvement in the exploration and integration of knowledge on a variety of topics. Students may not substitute any course from another institution for the CISS.

Prerequisites: Students may not enroll in a CISS before they achieve at least sixth-semester standing and have completed all CORE Competency Courses and the Five-Course Interdisciplinary CORE Courses.