This course introduces students to the foundational concepts and skills needed to communicate effectively in writing for academic study and professional development. Students will learn how to use the four stages of the writing process - prewriting, drafting, revising, and editing - to create written communication that meets its intended purpose for its intended audience. Students will also be introduced to rhetorical styles and the role of outside sources in academic writing. Constructing and implementing effectively-designed search strategies for information to answer a critical inquiry or research question are also addressed in this course.

This course explores a wide range of literature for young adults, along with social and literary criticism that help to illuminate the impact of this literature. Through readings and discussion of both current and classic literature, students identify why literature is a powerful tool and how it can help young adults shape their lives. Learners respond to young adult literature through written analyses and critiques.

This course provides students with an in-depth study of how the portrayal of people with disabilities of many kinds - physical, emotional, social, and mental - in literature is reflective of the social and historical context in which it was written. Students apply close textual analysis of the imagery used to describe people with disabilities and evaluate the cultural attitudes this use of language reveals. Students read literature written by both disabled and non-disabled authors and analyze the ways that many stereotypical portrayals of disability undermine the disability community. Questions of how a culture decides what is "normal," how portrayals of the disability experience in literature differ between adults and children, and how the advocacy role is portrayed in literature are also examined. The goal of this course is to discover how literature can challenge our own assumptions about the experience of the disabled by contemplating what ultimately makes us human.

This course examines the political, social, economic, and cultural forces that shaped the development of world civilizations from 1000 CE to the present. The focus of study will move beyond basic geography and historic timelines to ask questions about cultural interactions, conflict, and the varying forces that impacted world history, as well as to evaluate interpretations of the past. Using both primary and secondary sources, students will critically examine connections and patterns of history with a particular focus on globalism, multiculturalism, nationalism, and religious conflict throughout Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Americas.