UNIV 0370: Foundations of College Literacy

A foundation of reading and writing will help you be successful. The Department of Student Transitions offers a literacy course, paired with a general education course, that will help you build the reading and writing skills you need to be successful in college. This course, Foundations of College Literacy (UNIV 0370) is designed to help you with the following skills:

  1. Active, critical, and deep college-level reading skills that allow you to tackle any type of reading assignment in a first-year general education course.
  2. College-level writing skills that allow you to answer any type of writing prompt or occasion in a first-year general education course.

What is Foundations of College Literacy?

More specifically, Foundations of College Literacy is not only designed to prepare you for your general education class, but also to practice and enhance the reading and writing skills necessary to succeed in all of your college coursework. The ability to read and absorb written information, and then to use this information to write clearly and critically, are necessary college skills and life skills can only be acquired with practice.  This course will help you explore and enjoy this process and become a better reader and writer by learning more about it. Also, this course will treat reading and writing as complementary disciplines, exposing you to the techniques involved in understanding college-level texts and utilizing these acquired comprehension techniques to improve your own writing. The course is not counted toward a degree requirement. For more information, Click on sample syllabus

Currently, we pair the following courses with UNIV 0370: Foundations of College Literacy

Course Number Course Name Course Syllabus
HIST 1320 Galileo to Gandhi World History II
HIST 2302 America in the Modern Era
PHIL 1301 Philosophy for Living
RELG 1320 World Religions

 

Who takes Foundations of College Literacy?

Students whose ACT (or equivalent) subscores on the Reading and Writing sections that fall below a 22 are required to take a Foundations of College Literacy course. However, anyone who wants to improve their reading and writing skills and practice those skills in a credit-bearing general education course are encouraged to enroll. Please note, though, that the course does not count toward a degree requirement.

 

What do students say about Foundations of College Literacy?

“This course and [the professor] both helped me be more successful as a first time college student.”

“This class helps fill in the gaps of things you […] learned in high school about writing.  This class will help you learn how [to] make yourself a better writer…”