A room full of 18 year old college kids and (no more than) 10 classes. What would you teach them: to have meaningful life skills, have a good understanding of the world, be decent people, etc. Try to avoid specialty related subjects and concentrate on core, fundamental skills that everyone would benefit from (according to YOU)
Assuming that the students want to learn and are prepared for the curriculum:
[ol]
[li]Non-Western culture[/li][li]How thinking works (based on Kahneman’s “Thinking Fast and Slow”)[/li][li]Financial literacy[/li][li]Statistical literacy[/li][li]Written and oral communication[/li][li]Basic information technology[/li][li]Practical physical science[/li][/ol]
Those last three could take two semesters each, which rounds out the ten item list quite nicely.
- Literature- focus on great books and understanding life through literary works
- Writing- half research, half technical writing
- A foreign language- preferably from a continent that the student does not have significant ancestry in
- Quantitative research (statistics focus)
- Sociology, with an emphasis on the American family
- Psychology, with an emphasis on relationships and family
- Biology with a focus on human health
- 20th century world history- with an emphasis on understanding the historical background of current events
- Media analysis
- Economics- with an emphasis on understanding current events