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First-Year Experience
Students meet Monday through Thursday from 10:00 a.m. - 12:00 noon and 1:00 p.m. until 3:00 p.m. in small seminars for six or seven weeks per course. The courses feature lively discussion, hands-on learning, collaborative assignments, problem-centered projects, and intensive reading and writing in close cooperation with an experienced faculty member.
Each learning community is followed by a two-week break or the winter vacation.
Once students complete the integrated first-year experience, they are ready to concentrate on courses required for their major early in their academic careers. For an explanation of the General Education requirements met by NCC's first-year experience, see Equivalencies.
The Courses
The College divides the first year into four consecutive eight-credit learning communities (called units):
Semester One
NCLC 110 Community of Learners
Objectives:
The themes for Unit I are Sense of Self, Ways of Learning and Knowing, and Higher Education. These themes provide the focus for the reading, writing, discussion, and questioning in seminar sessions. In the afternoon classes, much of the work develops the skills needed for a successful academic career and professional life. These skills include collaboration, information technology, problem solving, analytical reasoning, communication skills, and ways of learning.
The three main goals of Unit I are to develop academic ways of thinking, or habits of mind; to learn skills for working together; and to assist students with the transition to college life.
Major Assignments:
- Discovery, Part I
- Group Presentation on Higher Education
- Individual Student Website Project
- Unit I Portfolio
NCLC 120 The Natural World
Objectives:
This course will create a learning environment that allows students to exhibit knowledge of the chronological flow of events in the evolution of life and the process of evolution. Students will learn to understand analytical tools such as: measures of central tendency and variability; principals of measurement, confidence intervals and levels of confidence; and normal distribution and sampling. Students will also learn to discriminate between subjective and objective reasoning and information sources, and be able to apply this reasoning to practical societal and scientific problems. Through the course, students will learn to understand the importance of biology to human culture and history with specific references to disease organisms. They will also develop oral and written communication skills through critical thinking, argument development, organization and presentation.
Major Assignments:
- Discovery Project, Part II
- Debate on Controversial Science Projects
- Smithsonian Institution Naturalist Center field study
- Self-Selected Museum and Field Experience
- Unit II Portfolio
Semester Two
NCLC 130 The Social World
Objectives:
This third unit in the first-year NCC curriculum explores the construction of the social world across cultures and across time. Through the interdisciplinary study of history, literature, art, and philosophy students investigate how the multiple worlds they inhabit (and inherit) both explain and constrain social behavior. Individually, in groups and in small seminars, students probe questions fundamental to an understanding of the contemporary world: the creation of histories, the relationships between states and individuals, the crossings of cultural and geographical borders and the confrontations between the haves and have-nots within the global economy. Throughout this learning community, students also interrogate cultural artifacts that range from pot shards to e-zines and gain expertise in the discovery, interpretation and analytical application of evidence to illuminate the social world.
Major Assignments:
- Area Cultural Site Visits
- Group Projects
- Performance Attendance Essay
- Discovery Project, Part III
- Unit III Portfolio
NCLC 140 Self as Citizen
Objectives:
In Unit IV, students are asked to consider their sense of self in relationship to the idea of governance. Students explore the ideas, values, and principals that have been influential in establishing our social contract for living together as a community in the U.S., while still respecting and adhering to a sense of self. Students are also asked to consider the topic of citizenship and develop a coherent framework for participating as citizens.
Major Assignments:
- Hypertext Essay
- Citizenship Essay
- Discovery Project, Part IV
- Year-End Portfolio
If you would like more information about New Century College's First-Year Experience and/or Integrative Studies degree,
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If you would like to be a part of New Century College's First-Year Experience and/or Integrative Studies degree, please complete our
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