Freshman Seminars are small, substantive courses taught by members of the faculty (including those from Penn's professional schools) and open exclusively to freshmen. They are rigorous and demanding but with sufficient personal attention from the instructor to facilitate the student's adaptation to high academic expectations. Freshman Seminars tend to be focused in an area close to the instructor's research interests, although some departments offer seminar versions of introductory classes. Many students find the Freshman Seminars offer an excellent opportunity to explore areas not represented in high school curricula and to establish relationships with faculty members around areas of mutual intellectual interest.
Here are examples of recent offerings:
Issues in American Democracy
Massacres in History
Modern American Poetry
Lords of the Ring
Medicine, Culture and Bioethics in Japan
Proving Things: Algebra
Development Debate in India
Desire and Demand: Culture and Consumption in the Global Marketplace
Integrity
Homelessness and the Urban Crisis
Coming of Age in America
Snip and Tuck: A History of Surgery
Science, Magic and Religion
Girls Gone Wild: Reading Women’s Journeys, from the Wife of Bath to Thelma and Louise
Athens/Babylon: Images and Metaphors of the American City
The War In Iraq
The Invention of Modern Judaism
