All undergraduate programs at AUD include the Arts and Sciences Core Curriculum, an interdisciplinary foundation that develops essential skills and equips students to engage thoughtfully with complex ideas and challenges. The Core Curriculum reflects the belief that a university education should be a transformative journey, one that broadens intellectual horizons, encourages critical, independent thinking, and nurtures a passion for learning. It also underscores AUD’s commitment to preparing students for success in both their personal and professional lives.

The Core Curriculum is committed to a set of learning outcomes that are applicable across a wide spectrum of academic disciplines. These learning outcomes are as follows:

Learning Outcomes

Upon completion of the Core Curriculum, students will be able to

• Demonstrate effective communication skills in reading, writing, and speaking;
• Demonstrate an ability to identify and find information, evaluate its validity and relevance, and effectively and responsibly apply and disseminate information to address an issue;
• Recognize global cultural diversity and demonstrate an understanding of and respect for human values, perspectives and practices across different societies;
• Demonstrate and value individual thinking, self-awareness, and ethical behavior for responsible global citizenship;
• Demonstrate appropriate technological literacy and skills for personal and professional use;
• Demonstrate an ability to integrate ideas grounded in an understanding of historical, philosophical, cultural and/or scientific knowledge that results in creative and/or innovative thinking;
• Demonstrate an ability to analyze and synthesize issues, ideas, concepts, sources, data or events in formulating conclusions and solving problems; and,
• Demonstrate an ability to reason and solve quantitative problems as well as use quantitative and scientific methods and evidence to support arguments.

Thus, student completion of the Arts and Sciences Core is designed to ensure development of broad knowledge, skills and competencies that provide students with the essential foundation for success in their selected area of specialization.

Requirements

All undergraduate degree programs have incorporated the university’s Arts and Sciences Core Curriculum requirements. The following apply to all programs; however, degree candidates should consult the Programs section of the Undergraduate Catalog for the Arts and Sciences courses that are mandatory for their particular programs (i.e., substitutes for Arts and Sciences Electives.)

The Arts and Sciences Core consists of 36 credit hours of required courses distributed as follows:

Gateways to Higher Education

• I. General (0 credit hours)

  		Credit Hours
  UNIV 100*	The University Experience	0

  * Unless exempted

• II. English for Academic Purposes (6 credit hours)

  		Credit Hours
  ENGL 101	Composition and Rhetoric	3
  ENGL 102	Advanced Composition and Research	3

• III. Critical Thinking and Communication (3 credit hours)

  		Credit Hours
  PSPK 101	Public Speaking in Multicultural Contexts	3

• IV. Understanding Culture and Identity (3 credit hours) Options:

  		Credit Hours
  WLDC 201	Cultural Encounters and Historical Transformations	3
  WLDC 202	Culture and Innovation in a Globalized World	3

• IV. Applied Mathematics and Quantitative Reasoning* (3 credit hours)

  		Credit Hours
  MATH 101	Mathematics for the Arts	3
  MATH 200	Calculus for Business	3
  MATH 205	Calculus for Architecture	3
  MATH 210	Calculus I	3

  * Note that all degree candidates in Visual Communication, Interior Design, International Studies and Psychology must take MATH 101. All degree candidates in Business Administration must take MATH 200, all degree candidates in Architecture must take MATH 205, all degree candidates in Biology and Engineering must take MATH 210, and all candidates in Communication and Information Studies must take either MATH 101 or MATH 200, to fulfill the Core requirement for Mathematics.

The Big Questions

Students are required to take a total of 18 credit hours from The Big Questions courses: 3 credit hours from each of the five categories listed below, plus one elective course from a category of their choice.

• VI. Imagination, Expression and the Written Word (3 credit hours) Options:

  		Credit Hours
  ENGL 103	Introduction to Literature	3
  ENGL 210	Creative Writing	3
  ENGL 211	British Literature I	3
  ENGL 212	British Literature II	3
  ENGL221	American Literature I	3
  ENGL 222	American Literature II	3
  ENGL 231	World Literature I	3
  ENGL 232	World Literature II	3
  ENGL 275-78	Special Topics in Literature	3
  ENGL 311	World Mythology	3
  ENGL 312	Biography/Autobiography	3
  ENGL 313	Children’s Literature	3
  ENGL 314	Coming-of-Age Novels	3
  ENGL 315	Contemporary Female Authors	3
  ENGL 316	Prize-Winning Authors	3
  ENGL 475	Special Topics in Literature	3
  MEST 317	Arabic Literature in Translation	3

• VII. Cultures, Traditions and Societies (3 credit hours) Options:

  		Credit Hours
  ANTH 201	Introduction to Cultural Anthropology	3
  ANTH 311	Culture and Society in Postcolonial Africa	3
  GEOG 101	World Geography	3
  GEOG 310	Human Geography	3
  HIST 210	American History from the Beginnings to Reconstruction	3
  HIST 202	The United States in the Civil War	3
  HIST 212	Modern Europe	3
  HIST 251	World History to 1500 CE	3
  HIST 252	World History since 1500 CE	3
  HIST 310	The US in World Affairs	3
  HIST 350	Revolution and Reaction in the Global Cold War	3
  MEST 100	The Arabic Language	3
  MEST 210	Introduction to Middle East History	3
  MEST 280	The UAE Experience	3
  MEST 310	Islamic Civilization	3
  MEST 315	History of the Modern Middle East	3
  MEST 318	Cultures of the Middle East	3
  MEST 319	Politics in the Middle East	3
  MEST 320	The Qur’an: Text, History, and Meaning	3
  MEST 323	Islam: Historical and Society Aspects	3
  MEST 327	Islamic Politics	3
  MEST 343	Business in the Modern Middle East	3
  MEST 350	Religions of the Middle East	3
  MEST 352	Conflicts in the Middle East	3
  MEST 353	Women and Gender in the Middle East	3
  MEST 380	Society and Economics in the Gulf	3
  MEST 381	North Africa: Nation, Society, and Culture	3
  MEST 382	The Levant: Arab Lands of the Eastern Mediterranean	3
  MEST 383	Iraq: Reinventing the Nation	3
  POLS 200	Introduction to Political Science	3
  POLS 201	Comparative Political Systems	3
  PSYC 313	Social Psychology	3
  SOCI 201	Introduction to Sociology	3
  SOCI 301	Globalization	3
  SOCI 332	Culture and Society in South Asia	3
  SOCI 340	Technology and Society	3
  SOCI 344	Gender and Society	3
  SOCI 275	Selected Topics in Social Sciences	3
  SOCI 475	Special Topics in Social Sciences	3
  WLDC 301	Religions of the World	3

• VIII. Ethics, Thought and Consciousness (3 credit hours) Options:

  		Credit Hours
  PHIL 105	Introduction to Critical Thinking	3
  PHIL 201	Introduction to Philosophy/Logic	3
  PHIL 222	Professional Ethics	3
  PHIL 225	Ethics and Artificial Intelligence	3
  PHIL 250	Political Philosophy	3
  PHIL 260	Introduction to Bioethics	3
  PHIL 310	Ethics and Moral Philosophy	3
  PHIL 320	Metaphysics and the Study of Human Existence	3
  POLS 250	Political Philosophy	3
  PSYC 201	General Psychology	3
  PSYC 313	Social Psychology	3
  WLDC 301	Religions of the World	3

• IX. Science and the Nature of Reality (3 credit hours) Options:

  		Credit Hours
  BIOL 201	Principles of Biology	3
  BIOL 202	General Biology I w/ Lab	3
  CHEM 201	General Chemistry	3
  SCIE 201*	Life Sciences for Today	3
  SCIE 211	Water Sustainability	3
  SCIE 241	Principles of Human Nutrition	3
  SCIE 242	Women’s Health	3
  SCIE 251	Environmental Health and Sustainability	3
  SCIE 275	Selected Topics in Natural Sciences	3
  SCIE 341	Public Health	3

  * Students are prohibited from earning credit for both SCIE 201 and BIOL 201 or BIOL 202

The Core Experience

• X. Core Research and Reflection (3 credit hours)

  		Credit Hours
  HUMN 398	The Core Experience	3

Any courses in the Arts and Sciences (in- or outside the Core) that are not used to fulfill the Core requirements may be used as General Electives except by B.C.I.S candidates who should check their General Electives options on p. 150.

• English Division
• Humanities & Social Sciences Division
• Mathematics Division