2015-2016 Undergraduate Core Curriculum

The distinguishing quality of a university education is the intersection and blend of career preparation and life enrichment. Through the Core Curriculum, ULM joins these two purposes together, and both of these aspects of a good university experience were uppermost in the minds of the faculty and administrators when they established the new Core Curriculum. In fact, several principles have guided the building of ULM’s common core.

One fundamental concern was the desire to provide ULM students with opportunities to explore the interrelationship of knowledge in our increasingly complex, global society. Thus, an emphasis was placed upon offering courses that have an interdisciplinary content or that can be paired with other disciplines in challenging, informative ways to reveal the links that various endeavors of study possess. Students thus will have the freedom to explore different avenues of inquiry and to see how various kinds of knowledge connect.

Another governing principle was to expand our literary and cultural offerings to include the examination of the people, values, and societies of both Eastern and Western civilizations. This step was taken in the knowledge that a global perspective is a necessity for today’s students who will live and work in a world economy and in an ever-changing international environment.

A third key objective was to develop the writing, research, and communication skills of our students and to integrate these skills with a knowledge of the humanities and the sciences, particularly the areas of literature, the social sciences, the fine arts, history and mathematics.

Yet another effect of the Core Curriculum is a commonality of academic experiences at the general education level, which will enable a more seamless transfer of course credits among majors.

Above all, the Core Curriculum has been established to serve the long term educational needs of ULM students. Accordingly, we offer our undergraduate students this broader, stronger educational foundation that was created and adapted from the Louisiana Board of Regents Statewide General Education Requirements. The Board of Regents Statewide General Education Requirements stipulate that a minimum of 39 hours of credit in certain areas of English composition, mathematics, the natural sciences, the humanities, the fine arts, the social/behavioral sciences, and computer literacy must be earned by students pursuing a B.A. (Bachelor of Arts), B.S. (Bachelor of Science), or a Bachelor’s (non-designated) degree. (A complete list of the Louisiana Board of Regents Statewide General Education Requirements can be found here ). ULM’s Core Curriculum, which requires that a total of 39 hours of credit be earned in various fields of study, adheres to and meets the stipulations of the Board of Regents requirements. The Core Curriculum ensures that ULM’s students will be intellectually well-equipped to complete their chosen programs of study, as well as to find a meaningful place in today’s rapid-paced, integrated world.

ULM Common Core Curriculum

Foundation Courses

It is imperative that undergraduate students entering ULM are provided with a strong academic foundation upon which to build their future college careers. Ultimately, this structure, which follows many national trends, brings a much needed breadth and commonality to the ULM academic experience and makes it easier for students to transfer between majors.

Core Curriculum Guidelines

1. The student’s work in a major or minor may count toward meeting the University Core.
2. Transfer students can apply equivalent hours earned at other universities to meet ULM core requirements (equivalency to be determined by the appropriate department head and the Board of Regents’ Statewide Student Transfer Guide and General Education Articulation Matrix).
3. All freshman students are required to take the University Seminar for one credit hour (the course will not count toward any degree program and will be nontransferable).
4. In the absence of a compelling reason, degree programs should refrain from defining or limiting student choices within the menu of prescribed general education courses.

Core Curriculum Abbreviations Used in Degree Plans or Programs of Study

Some degree plans specified that certain courses must be taken from within a menu of the sets of courses in the core curriculum. For those that did so, first the specific course will be listed in the degree plan, followed by the appropriate abbreviation which indicates which requirement is being fulfilled by the specified required core curriculum course. For example, if MATH 1013  and MATH 1031  must be taken by Computer Science majors, then the requirement will be listed as “MATH 1013 cm, MATH 1031 cm”. The core curriculum abbreviations which have been used are as follows: