Undergraduate Curriculum
The undergraduate curriculum creates a flexible system of courses that gives coherence, breadth, and depth to the four years of study. This structure helps students become knowledgeable across academic boundaries and able to think critically within a discipline or mode of thought. The pillars of the Bard education are the structure of the first year; the program- and concentration-based approach to study; Moderation; distribution by modes of thought; and the Senior Project. Students move from the Lower College (first and second years), which focuses on general education and introduces academic and artistic areas, to the Upper College (third and fourth years), which involves advanced study of particular subjects and more independent work.
Structure of the First Year
All first-year students participate in a common curriculum, consisting of the Language and Thinking Program, First-Year Seminar, Citizen Science, and first-year advising. First-year students also take elective courses.
Program Approach to Concentration
Bard requires that each student major in a stand-alone academic program, possibly in conjunction with a non-stand-alone field of study (a concentration), or with another program in a joint major.
Distribution Requirements
As students fulfill distribution requirements, they become familiar with many academic areas and approaches. This exposure helps reveal their primary area of academic interest, offers perspective on their major, and broadens their scholarly point of view.
Moderation
Moderation is undertaken in the second semester of the sophomore year. Through this process students make the transition from the Lower College to the Upper College and establish their major in a program. (Transfer students entering with the equivalent of two full years of credit should, if possible, moderate during the first semester of residence, but in no case later than the second.)
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Each student prepares two Moderation papers, the first assessing his or her curriculum, performance, and experience in the first two years, and the second identifying his or her goals and proposed study plan for the final two years. The student also submits a sample of work he or she has done in the program—for example, a long paper written for a course. The work is reviewed by a board of three faculty members, who also evaluate the student’s past performance, commitment, and preparedness in the field; make suggestions for the transition from the Lower to the Upper College; and approve, deny, or defer promotion of the student to the Upper College.
Senior Project
The Senior Project is an original, individual, focused project growing out of the student’s cumulative academic experiences. Students have great flexibility in choosing the form of their project. For example, a social studies project might be a research project, a close textual analysis, a report of findings from fieldwork, or a photographic essay, while a science project might be a report on original experiments, an analysis of published research findings, or a contribution to theory.
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Preparation for the Senior Project begins in the junior year. Students consult with advisers, and pursue course work, tutorials, and seminars directed toward selecting a topic, choosing the form of the project, and becoming competent in the analytical and research methods required by the topic and form. Students in some programs design a Major Conference during their junior year, which may take the form of a seminar, tutorial, studio work, or field or laboratory work. One course each semester of the student’s final year is devoted to completing the Senior Project. The student submits the completed project to a board of three professors who conduct a Senior Project Review. Written projects are filed in the library’s archives; samples of each arts project appear with a statement by the student in
Word and Image, an online publication.
