Activities for Well-being and Success
The Activities for Well-being and Success co-curricular course options support students' personal development, health, and well-being. Types of courses include physical well-being, creative expression, mental/emotional well-being, and success.
Arts and Culture
Arts and culture courses prepare students to critically engage with the socio-cultural contexts of our contemporary world. These courses develop skills for critical and creative analysis, encourage innovative problem-solving, and support practices of engagement that empower students to be active participants in the creation of knowledge and understanding.
Communication Intensive
These courses focus on instruction in at least one form of communication—written, oral, etc. Assignments require students to draft and revise communication products in response to detailed feedback from peers and instructors. In the process, students learn to give actionable feedback and expand their knowledge of best practices in communication processes and products.
Composition
This course provides direct instruction in composition. Students examine and interpret communication practices and apply what they learn to their own written, aural, and visual compositions. Class projects ask students to communicate in a variety of modes and to attend to audience, purpose, and context.
Distribution Pathway
The Distribution Pathway is a flexible pathway that allows for a more customizable experience within the Essential Education curriculum. This option may be more suitable for students who have a substantial number of AP and/or transfer credits.
Essential Abilities
Essential Education was developed around four undergraduate student learning goals and 12 performance criteria. These performance criteria are the Essential Abilities. By design, these abilities are centered throughout the curriculum in coursework, hands-on experiences, and more. The Essential Abilities are the critical skills that tomorrow's workforce needs—and they are what will prepare students for success after Tech, both personally and professionally, no matter which undergraduate degree they earn.
Essential Education Experience (E3)
The Essential Education Experience helps to prepare our students for an ever-changing, dynamic, and diverse world. These active, hands-on experiences expand students' interactions with the greater society and allow them to make connections among their Essential Education courses. The experience is designed to increase students' social awareness, global understanding, and cultural competencies in a way that fosters lifelong global citizenship through their personal and professional lives.
Essential Education Minor Pathway
The Essential Education Minor Pathway is the primary pathway for Essential Education, allowing students to earn a secondary credential (minor) alongside their undergraduate degree as a part of their current course of study. This option is encouraged for most students.
First-Year Experience
The first-year experience encourages critical thinking through a variety of disciplinary lenses. Students will build on their major with the following academic elements: Michigan Tech Seminar, Math, Natural and Physical Science, STEM, Composition, and Foundations in the Human World.
Foundations in the Human World
The courses in this list are gateways to the disciplines that comprise the SHAPE units: Departments of Social Sciences, Humanities, Visual and Performing Arts, and Psychology and Human Factors, as well as the College of Business. The Foundations in the Human World courses ensure that students have exposure to the arts, humanities, and/or human sciences in their first year to complement first-year courses in math, natural and physical sciences, and composition.
Husky Folio
The Husky Folio is an ePortfolio that is integrated into every Essential Education course—it enables students to integrate their learning and to reflect on how they are developing their Essential Abilities as they progress through the program.
Intercultural Competency
The Intercultural Competency requirement is aligned with Michigan Tech's vision to be "a globally recognized technological university that educates students, advances knowledge, and innovates to improve the quality of life and to promote mutual respect and equity for all people within the state, the nation, and the global community." The courses included on this list are designed to support students in their development of a critical understanding of diversity, inclusion, power, and privilege.
Math
The Math list includes common entry-level mathematical and quantitative-thinking courses for a variety of majors.
Michigan Tech Seminar
This requirement is designed to help students map out their path through college, to develop the habits and mindsets of successful students, and to build a sense of community and belonging with Michigan Tech. Courses fulfilling this requirement are also intended to introduce students to, and encourage an understanding of, the undergraduate student learning goals and their connection to modern skills desired by employers. Students will learn skills in reflection and folio thinking and will begin their Husky Folios.
Natural and Physical Science
The Natural and Physical Science list includes common entry-level courses in fields that help students understand how the world and universe around them work. Courses come from fields like biology, chemistry, ecology, geoscience, and physics.
SHAPE
SHAPE stands for Social Sciences, Humanities, and the Arts for People and the Economy/Environment. Coined by the British Academy, the term was developed as a collective name for the disciplines that we've previously referred to as HASS (Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences) that “help us make sense of the human world, to value and express the complexity of life and culture, and to understand and solve global issues."
The SHAPE list includes all courses on the following lists: Foundations in the Human World, Arts and Culture, Communication Intensive, Intercultural Competency, and additional courses that fit the SHAPE mission but are not part of the other included lists.
STEM
STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. The STEM list includes all courses on the Essential Education Math and Natural and Physical Science lists, as well as other STEM courses such as computer science, engineering, and other technology-focused courses.
Upper Division
At Michigan Tech, upper division courses are 3000-4000 level courses (as designated by the course number).