This coming fall Boston College will begin piloting a renewed core curriculum, unveiling nine semester-long offerings for freshmen that apply an interdisciplinary lens to contemporary social problems and perennial questions about the human condition. Three are courses that will utilize team teaching, with faculty from divergent disciplines working side by side.

The pilot initiative, the first core renewal since 1991, will in six cases also introduce a lesser-known approach, which John Rakestraw, director of the University鈥檚 recently established Center for Teaching Excellence, refers to as 鈥渢andem teaching.鈥 This involves faculty members teaching separate courses with overlying topics to a shared group of students.聽

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Complex Problems | Fall 2015

GLOBAL IMPLICATIONS OF CLIMATE CHANGE
Brian Gareau, Sociology, and Tara Pisani Gareau, Earth and Environmental Sciences


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Complex Problems | Fall 2015

UNDERSTANDING RACE, GENDER, AND VIOLENCE
Marilynn Johnson, History, and Shawn McGuffey, Sociology


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Enduring Questions | Fall 2015

TRUTH-TELLING IN LITERATURE
Allison Adair, English

TRUTH-TELLING IN HISTORY
Sylvia Sellers-Garcia, History


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Enduring Questions | Spring 2016

EPIDEMICS, DISEASE, AND HUMANITY
Mary Kathleen Dunn, Biology

DEVISING THEATER: ILLNESS AS METAPHOR
Scott Cummings, Theatre


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Enduring Questions | Fall 2015

HUMANS, NATURE, AND CREATIVITY
Min Song, English

INQUIRING ABOUT HUMANS AND NATURE
Holly Vande Wall, Philosophy


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Complex Problems | Spring 2016

GENOCIDE AND CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY
Devin Pendas, History, and Maxim D. Shrayer, Slavic and Eastern Languages and Literatures


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Enduring Questions | Spring 2016

POWER, JUSTICE, WAR: THE ANCIENTS
Robert Bartlett, Political Science

POWER, JUSTICE, WAR: THE MODERNS
Aspen Brinton, Philosophy


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Enduring Questions | Spring 2016

EPIDEMICS, DISEASE, AND HUMANITY
Mary Kathleen Dunn, Biology

DEVISING THEATER: ILLNESS AS METAPHOR
Scott Cummings, Theatre


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Enduring Questions | Spring 2016

SPIRITUAL EXERCISES: ENGAGEMENT, EMPATHY, ETHICS
Brian Robinette, Theology

AESTHETIC EXERCISES: ENGAGEMENT, EMPATHY, ETHICS
Daniel Callahan, Music