Making the Most of Your UW Experience Seminar: HAS 397D

Fall Quarter 2008

Tuesdays, 3:30-6:20pm, MGH 231 & 206

Course Description:
This seminar provides a venue for students to explore their strengths, interests, academic and career aspirations, and resources available at UW. At an early stage in your UW experience, you will actively engage in the development of a personal vision for your future. Through interaction with community and campus leaders in various fields, you will craft a mission statement and investigate opportunities to engage in the community and to take control, and full advantage, of your academic career at the UW. You will begin to develop the tools necessary to craft a cohesive, evolving plan of action to guide yourself through the UW and future endeavors, to draw upon when faced with challenging decisions. These tools will be useful for scholarship applications, graduate school and the professional fields. The Autumn quarter course is limited to Sophomores. The course will be offered again in Winter quarter for Freshmen.

Course Objectives:

  1. Develop a better sense of the responsibilities of academic success;
  2. Become more engaged and take a proactive role in achieving your goals by understanding the resources available to you and how to use them well;
  3. Develop a map or plan of action;
  4. Develop a mission statement, which will lead to a personal statement;
  5. Effectively present your academic and personal goals to mentors and faculty; and
  6. Prepare to effectively present your academic and personal goals to scholarship committees and graduate school.

COURSE SYLLABUS

READING (due Sept 30th): William Cronon; "Only Connect..." The Goals of a Liberal Education

ASSIGNMENT (due Oct 7th): Vision & Values worksheet #1 

ASSIGNMENT (due Oct 14th): Defining Communities Exercise