COURSE DESCRIPTION OF FYE COURSES

ANTH 109b: FYE: Skeletons in Chicago’s Closets… (SB)

Interested in bones? Biological anthropologists study human biological diversity, including variation and changes in skeletal structure in past and present populations. This provocative course will introduce students to forensic anthropology and paleoanthropology, and will also compare skeletons of nonhuman species. A wealth of information can be extracted from bones - everything from an individual’s sex to speciation and evolutionary change. Students will engage in hands-on labs, discussions of readings, guest lectures by area researchers, a fascinating behind-the-scenes Field Museum tour, and will also explore a variety of other Chicago museums, skeletal collections, and exhibits.

ART 109: FYE: Art, Architecture, and Urban Design in Chicago (FA)

This field-based course explores art in an urban environment, examines the relationships between art and urban culture, and considers the role of art in an urban setting. Students will gain a familiarity with Chicago as a cultural home; they will evaluate the role of public art in Chicago, examine the design and purpose of open spaces, and gain a familiarity with the Chicago school of architecture.

CMT-THEA 109C: FYE: Chicago: The Audobon/ Northeastern/Redmoon Theater Partnership (FA)

The focus of this general education introduction to theater class will be its partnership with Chicago’s Redmoon Theater. Redmoon is an acclaimed community-based theater which brings theater to underserved Chicago communities. To facilitate this partnership, Northeastern students will meet one day a week for class at Audobon Elementary School, which has been adopted by Redmoon Theater. Northeastern students will have opportunities to work with Redmoon Theater artists in Audobon classrooms and participate in Redmoon initiatives and internships.

CS 109: FYE: The Information Age: Its Impact on Chicago's Culture (SB)

The 21st century has seen the genesis of the information age. Advances in computer technology have made immediate access to information and sophisticated processing of information commonplace in business, science, medicine, education, various professional areas, and many aspects of personal life. This course focuses on how this has impacted Chicago's culture and its diverse communities.

EDFN 109: Schooling Chicago: Communities, Public Education and Change (SB)

This course analyzes education in and outside Chicago Public Schools as a key social institution that both influences and is influenced by the larger society. You will be introduced to a wide array of topics and case studies that elaborate on the embeddedness of classrooms and schools in social environments across Chicago. This course will span a variety of school processes such as curricular differentiation, social and economic reproduction, voluntary associations (extra-curricular clubs, parent organizations), social groupings and peer influence. Particular attention is paid to questions about the relationship between social stratification and education. For example, how is the structure, content, and funding of schools across Illinois affected by wider social and political conflicts? Does educational attainment affect an individual’s economic status? Does education promote social equality? This course will introduce students to the use of new information technologies in K-12 education.

ELAD 109: FYE: School’s Out: Chicago’s Bouquet of Nontraditional Educational Programs (FA)

Chicago is renowned for its world class museums, music, theaters, gardens, zoos, and other attractions. From the Museum of Broadcasting to the Art Institute - all of these institutions have educational programs open to the citizens of Chicago. Explore them via internet, interviews, guest presenters, and field trips. Open your mind to the diversity of learning and teaching opportunities available outside of school in our city. This course will enable you to:

• Gain an appreciation of many of these programs
• Raise your awareness of the various fields of knowledge involved
• Use findings to create written, oral, and electronic presentations about these programs
• Sharpen your research , writing, and thinking skills
• Probe career opportunities
• Expand your horizons and creativity

ENGL 109: FYE: Literature and Diversity in Chicago (Title varies) (HU)

The various topics offered under this title explore the rich literary landscape in all its diversity in Chicago.

ENGL 109A: FYE: Chicago's Literary Diversity: Reading the Neighborhoods

This course explores how literary Chicago enters into discourses on race and ethnicity in twentieth century literature. Beginning with the Great Migration, students sample literary history produced by people who settled or passed through Chicago. Writers have used Chicago as a setting for major works and sociological studies have attempted to focus on Chicago's neighborhoods and how they were formed as a result of immigration from other countries and migration from the American South. The course examines several works from popular perspectives, fiction, autobiography, journalism, humor, folktales, cultural criticism and regional studies to reach a better understanding of the city.

ENGL 109B: FYE: Reading and Writing the Literary and Political Landscapes of Chicago

From the Haymarket “riot” of 1886 to the Pullman Strike of 1894 to the Black Sox scandal of 1919 to the trial of Abbie Hoffman and the Chicago Seven in the aftermath of the Democratic Convention of 1968, Chicago has, to say the least, a colorful and, quite literally, explosive political history. As with any major urban center in the United States, Chicago bears the historical scars and contemporary fruits of vibrant and violent class conflict, labor insurgencies, racial strife, immigrant struggles, and activism for social justice. Part and parcel of this historical legacy is a rich spate of cultural production that attempts to comprehend this past in those historical moments and in our contemporary era.

ENGL 109C: FYE: Drama and Diversity in Chicago

In this class, we will analyze and experience Chicago theater.  By emphasizing theater that challenges social and cultural norms, we will consider how drama works to create and define diverse urban communities and how it offers alternative visions to the status quo. This class will emphasize writing and reading about drama, interviewing theater personnel and taking notes on actual theater performances, and relating art to social and political diversity.  We will attend 3-4 performances during the course of the semester.

ENGL 109D: FYE: ENGL 109 D:  Language and Literacy in Ethnolinguistic Chicago

Chicago is a city of shifting and competing identities.  For instance, thousands of Chicanos and Mexicans came to Chicago after World War I and the Immigration Act of 1917, and today, these and other Latinos, such as Puerto Ricans, constitute one of every four residents throughout the Windy City.  This course approaches Chicago as a site of contact among groups of people, and it examines the ways that these groups have established, negotiated, and defended identities through the use of language and literacy. 

ESCI 109: FYE: Chicago Rocks! Geology in the City (NS)

Did you ever wonder…

• Why are there so many tornadoes in the Midwest ... but not in the city?
• Where does your Xbox get its energy?
• Where does your trash end up?
• What happens when you flush?
• How did Lake Michiganform?
• What “holds up” the Sears Tower?
• How did Blue Islandget its name?
• Why is northeastern Illinois so flat?

The answers to these questions, and many more, can be found in this introductory course which explores the geological environment of Chicago.

FL-SPAN 109: FYE: The Hispanic Influence in Chicago (HU)

According to the American Community Survey of the U.S. Census (2003), over one quarter of Chicago’s population is Hispanic. This ever-increasing demographic has a significant cultural, historical, political, social, literary and linguistic impact on the city of Chicago. This course seeks to explore and develop an appreciation for the diversity of these Spanish-speaking groups and their invaluable contributions to the surrounding communities and to society in general.
Note: FL-SPAN 109 is presented in a "bilingual" format (English & Spanish)

G&ES 109: FYE: Chicago Geographies (SB)

G&ES 109A: FYE: Global Chicago

This is an introductory course in urban geography that provides a broad overview of the Chicago metropolitan area in the global context.  We will explore the place of Chicago as a hub in the global economy, as well as the many different ways that global forces have impacted social relations and spatial practices in the metropolis.

G&ES 109B: FYE: Environmental Chicago

Students study the relationships between human settlement and the natural environments in the metropolitan area including environmental problems, their causes, and possible solutions.  Issues such as waste disposal and recycling, brownfields, suburban sprawl, air and water pollution, water supply, flooding, and drainage, invasive species, and urban parks are investigated, with classroom discussion and field trips.

HPERA PEMT 109: FYE: Chicago Body Works (NS)

This course will give students a comprehensive and practical view of the importance of fitness and nutrition in their daily lives. Students will be engaged in activities that they can participate in for life. They will learn the underlying fundamentals of a fit for life attitude. Each student will be provided with the knowledge and understanding of how to assess their current level of fitness and how to make improvements in the five health-related fitness component areas (cardiovascular fitness, body composition, flexibility, muscular strength and muscular endurance) through various physical and skill related activities. Also emphasized will be the importance and application of proper nutrition. A strong focus will be the multifaceted and diverse challenges faced by individuals committed to pursing wellness in Chicago.

JUST 109: FYE: Justice in Chicago (SB)

Justice in Chicago provides first year students with an opportunity to critically examine social injustices in institutions and social structures through a critical lens.  Using Chicago as a lab, students actively discover its diversity and complexity through readings, speakers, films, and field experiences.

During the semester, you will experience justice in many forms.  Some of those forms will be familiar to you, such as learning about the court system, and some will be new, such as meeting judges and attorneys.   In this course, you shall get out of the classroom and into various communities, such as a courtroom, a courthouse jail, and a community organization which deals with issues of poverty and inequality.  We will consider the question: Can there be justice if there is inequality? via readings, field trips, speakers and films.

LING 109: FYE: Language & Diversity in Chicago (HU)

Hands-on research, using Chicago’s rich diversity of languages in contact as a laboratory, will enable you to understand the mechanisms, dynamics, and manipulations of language and language use.  Students will explore the following questions:

• What is language?
• What makes it universal?
• What makes it unique?
• How can it be used as a tool?
• How does it unite or divide?
• What is language contact and how does it affect you?
• What is the relationship between language and identity?
• What is language diversity and what brings it about?
• How does an awareness of language make you a stronger, more confident communicator?

LLAS 109: FYE: Art, Thought, and Revolution in Chicago (SB)

An introduction to the cultural life of Chicago Latino youth with its regional differences with key themes/symbols and cultural norms created by the historical interaction between Latinos and American society as expressed in literature, art, music, and folklore. Attention will also be given to change and continuity in Latino cultural norms on the basis of historical events.

The class explores the history of art and its role in the civilizations from Modernism, the mural renaissance and the civil rights movement. Using the rich artistic legacy of this area, the class examines the way art functions across borders and how borders have been constructed, debated, and lived through in the art of the past.

MUS 109: FYE: Chi-Tunes: Music In Chicago (FA)

This course is designed to increase the first year student's awareness, understanding and enjoyment of a variety of musical styles through attending live performances. Students will learn the basics of reading and writing music, music history, and music's place in society and culture through pre and post concert discussions.

MUS/DANC 109: FYE: Stepping Out – Dance in Chicago (FA)

A course designed to increase the student’s awareness, understanding and enjoyment of a variety of styles of aesthetic/theatrical dance. The course is a non-movement based approach to learning about dance as an art form, and will focus on learning about ballet, modern, jazz and ethnic dance through lectures, discussions, the attendance of outside performances, written assignments and service learning with dance organizations.

PSCI 109: FYE: Civic Engagement, Community and Social Change in Chicago

This colloquium is a three-credit course that combines the traditional classroom setting and community service to explore the meaning and interconnection of community, citizenship, politics, diversity, civic engagement and social change. Students enrolled in this course spend time developing their interpersonal and intrapersonal skills (such as, self-awareness, critical thinking and problem-solving skills, leadership skills), become skilled at civic engagement (action strategies and plan, project management, communication, negotiation and teamwork), as well as reading academic literature that examines concepts of democracy, power, and justice.

PSYC 109: FYE: Growing Up in Chicago (SB)

This is a course that introduces students to the basics of child psychological development. What are the steps of development? Which developmental steps are unique to every individual? Which developmental steps are universal and which are culturally determined? Chicago has many resources, historical, art and cultural museums, schools, and its people, that will be used to explore the answers to these questions. Through a combination of hands on activities, verbal and written reflections, students in this class will discover what it means to be a developing human being here in Chicago.

SOC 109: FYE: Investigating Chicago (Title varies) (SB)

Investigating Chicago provides an opportunity for freshmen to explore Chicago as a living, dynamic entity through the lens of Sociology.  Using the city as a lab, students actively discover the complexity and diversity of Chicago through readings, films, speakers, and field experiences.

SOC 109A: FYE: IMMIGRATION AND MIGRATION

This course provides an introduction to migration theories, methodologies, and policies.  Students will develop an understanding of the sociological approach to migration.  We will focus on the Chicago area, but also analyze migration at the international and national levels.