Courses are focused on varying themes from a broad range of disciplines, and they offer incoming students an opportunity to enter into a small learning community with a team of student and professional mentors.
Here is a sample of the interesting course titles from the past few years:
- Think Like a Freak
- Bones and Bloodshed: Forensic Anthropology and Crime Scene Investigation
- Chemistry and Art
- Computational Thinking for Problem Solving
- Sports and Ethics
- Are We There Yet?: The Great American Road Trip
- Bizarre Foods
- Beyond Despacito - Latin Music in America
- Winning Strategies: Games, Sports, and Life
- The Social Science of Happiness
- Physics in Video Games
- Deconstructing Disney
- Great Ideas in Mathematics
- Heroes and Antiheroes in Theatre and Film
Intended learning outcomes:
To give our students strategies for academic success in college.
- We communicate the standards of college-level work to our students in an environment where it is safe to ask questions and take risks.
- We offer students workshops on skills necessary for academic success and introduce them to resources for academic support on campus.
- We work with students on written and oral communication skills.
- We provide space and structure for exploring interests, defining goals, and making plans to achieve them.
To help our students become engaged members of the campus community.
- We provide common learning experiences, like the Summer Reading Program, the Service Blitz, and the first-year convocations.
- We introduce students to the values of the Illinois College community, including the importance of understanding diversity in the United States and of seeing themselves as members of a global community.
- We help students form relationships with peers, student mentors, and academic advisors.
- We connect students with student success staff and support centers which foster engagement and build community.
To cultivate in our students the habits of lifelong, active learners.
- We model and talk about the importance of learning from a variety of sources and we guide students as they examine the benefits and limitations of different types of information sources.
- We facilitate students’ discovery of the value of a liberal arts education, in connection with the goals/themes of our BLUEprint General Education Program.
- We help students explore modes of active learning, including critical reading, discussion, research, collaboration, and critical and creative thinking.