Department of the Core

At UST, we approach a student’s education differently from most schools. We treat the Core Curriculum as an opportunity to help our students pursue excellence and discern the purpose of their lives. We aim to form persons towards the good and foster their professional aspirations. The two strengths are connected: if we form our students’ intellectual capacities and help them grasp a clearer sense of the nature of a good life, these are the same persons that will go on to be successful and fulfilled practitioners of their professions.

The Renewed Core is designed for both an improved educational experience and a streamlined path to graduation. While the old core required a total of 59 credit hours to complete, the Renewed Core is only 45 hours for students with no transfer credit.

All students must have a minimum of 120 hours to graduate with a Bachelor’s degree, so that leaves students with 75 hours in which to complete a major. Most students can take 2-3 Core courses per semester in the first 2 years and be Core complete before junior year.

Dual and AP credit counts towards your overall 120-hour credit requirement for the bachelor’s degree but cannot replace Core credit. Students entering with 15 hours or more of transfer credit complete streamlined versions of the Core.

For example, students entering with 15 hours of transfer credit complete a specially designed 30-hour Core instead of the full 45-hour Core. Ask your advisor for more information about transfer tiers.

No, our Core is distinctive, and classes must be taken from UST for Core credit. The Renewed Core at UST ensures that graduating students have participated in a shared, transformational educational experience that can’t be had anywhere else. We do offer Core classes during breaks.

There will always be Core courses available in every semester. As we continue the roll out of the Renewed Core, every course will be available every academic year.

Yes. Everyone takes the same intentionally designed Core no matter their major.

You may take philosophy and theology courses simultaneously.

For example, Theology 1301 “Faith, Reason, and Revelation” does not require you to have taken Philosophy 1301 “Philosophy of Nature and the Human Person.” Since, by its nature, philosophy anticipates theology and theology sometimes presupposes philosophy, you may find it more helpful (when scheduling permits) to take certain philosophy courses prior to certain theology courses. Your advisor can help you make these decisions.

Your adviser has a list of course equivalencies that will help you figure out how the classes you’ve already taken fulfil class requirements in the Renewed Core. The work you’ve already done will not be lost. Furthermore, since the Renewed Core is smaller in terms of overall credit hours, most students will find that switching to the Renewed Core will not add any time to degree completion.

In spite of technological advances, most meaningful education still happens with and through books. Most of our classes use primary texts, such as Plato’s dialogues or Homer’s Odyssey, because we want our students to have the experience of authentic engagement with the great minds of the past as they originally expressed their ideas. This process can be challenging, but our instructors actively work with students to help them develop the intellectual skills necessary to engage with great texts. 

The Renewed Core is divided into four sequences: I. “Foundations”; II. “The Humanities in Western Civilization”; III. “The Order and Unity of the World”; and IV. “Life of the Mind Above Reason.”

All students will begin by taking the four courses in the “Foundations” sequence: Liberal Studies 1301 “Foundations of Liberal Learning”; History 1301 “History of Western Culture and Ideas”; Philosophy 1301 “The Philosophy of Nature and the Human Person”; and Theology 1301 “Faith, Reason, and Revelation.”

view core map

Core classes that also serve as prerequisites for classes in your major count for both Core credit and the prerequisite.

Yes. Several Core classes are offered in the winter and summer terms, and some are offered as part of study abroad courses as well.  

At UST, we seek an understanding of ourselves as human persons endowed with intellectual and imaginative capacities and free will, so that we may be empowered to pursue wisdom and to cultivate virtues, in which our humanity is fulfilled.

In short, we’re all working together to discern what it means to live lives of purpose. No matter your major, you’ll find that the disciplines explored in your core courses—whether in theology, philosophy, history, literature, math, or political science—will help orient your education towards a higher purpose.  

We want students to be taught by teachers committed to the goals of the Core. Many of the teachers in your Core classes were hired explicitly to teach full-time in the Core. Because of this commitment to putting teachers dedicated to the mission of the Core front-and-center, some early Core courses may have as many as 60 students. This number is far smaller than what you can expect to find in large state schools, where general education courses routinely include hundreds of students. Outside of the Foundations sequence, the first four courses in the Core, most of the Core classes are capped at about 30 students. 

15 courses for a total of 45 credit hours. Students who come in with more than 15 hours of transfer credit will take a streamlined core. For example, students entering with between 15 and 29 transfer credits take a reduced, 30-hour Core. Ask your advisor for more information about the different transfer tiers.

The synthesis list is part of the old Core and is no longer required for the Renewed Core.

“Foundations of Liberal Learning” opens the door to the core curriculum. In it, students develop facility in reasoning and communicating, with a focus on honing these skills for success in their subsequent studies. Students will be introduced to what a liberal arts education means, how it differs from other educational experiences, and why it is important. They’ll also be introduced to the foundational principles of the liberal arts of grammar, logic, and rhetoric.

Liberal education has nothing to do with political affiliation and is distinct from the visual arts. Liberal education is an approach to education that prioritizes instruction in the seven liberal arts that comprise the trivium—grammar, logic, and rhetoric—and the quadrivium—arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy.

learn more