The core curriculum at Fairfield University is one of the largest in the country, bigger than any other Jesuit college or university except for Marquette University.
Fairfield requires students to take 20 classes or 60 credits of core courses. Core takes up half of the general graduation requirement of 40 courses, 120 credits.
The core curriculum includes five academic areas: mathematics and natural sciences; history and social/behavioral sciences; philosophy religious studies, and applied ethics; English and visual/performing arts and modern or classical languages.
The Fairfield core is structured to give students knowledge in many areas, test their interests in new subjects, and even help in selection of a major or minor.
But completion of such an extensive core curriculum is not something all students are enthusiastic about.
“I feel like we have a lack of choice in choosing our classes and also the depth we can get into our major or classes we are more drawn to,” said senior communication major Elide Grabowski.
The Dolan School of Business has its own core for business majors in addition to the general core, which adds frustration as well.
“I don’t have time to take the classes I want to and because I’m in the business school I have two cores and that’s too much,” said senior management major Theodora Livadiotis.
Boston College, located in Chestnut Hill, Mass., also a Jesuit Catholic university, requires students to complete 15 core courses. Five less courses may sound minimal, but that’s equivalent to an entire semester at Fairfield.
Dr. Mary Frances Malone, associate academic vice president, calls the core the “hallmark of the Fairfield experience” and probably the most important aspect of a Fairfield education.
“Student often boast double majors or triple minors, a lot of time it’s because of double counting core classes toward majors and minors,” said Malone.
She said that the range of core course choices is very wide and students can choose courses that apply to their interests.
“If people were more intentional about their choices and the core, they could have a much richer experience [at Fairfield] especially if they relate it to their major, instead of just getting it out of the way,” said Malone.
While the core requirements expose students to many different subjects, it also requires them to take multiple classes in some areas.
For example, students must first complete two religion and two philosophy classes, after which they are required to take a third, upper level religion, philosophy, or applied ethics course. For students who realize they dislike these areas of education, it can be a demanding requirement to fulfill.
“I still have mixed feelings about the core because I liked learning some of the stuff I did, but I really hated taking so many classes in math and science.” said Jimmy Judge ’05, an international studies major.
Some students have had a positive experience completing the core curriculum and appreciate it.
Amy Miklos ’05, an art history major, said, “I like it because I didn’t really have a focus of study and I like that I had to and got to study everything, and it helped me pick my major.”
A liberal education can help you when you leave college as a well-rounded Fairfield graduate. According to the Fairfield mission statement, “the liberally educated person is able to assimilate and organize facts, to evaluate knowledge, to identify issues, to use appropriate methods of reasoning and to convey conclusions persuasively in written and spoken word.” According to some, this type of education produces a desirable employee.
“A Fairfield professor once told me that if I was ever sitting at an interview between a Yale or Harvard graduate to make a point to say that FU has one of the largest cores in the country,” said Meghan O’Sullivan, a senior majoring in communication. “Because it shows how diversely educated you are, whereas those other candidates mostly took classes pertaining only to their major.”
The core here at Fairfield seems like a necessary evil to some students but beneficial to others. Every student leaves with knowledge is a wide area of subjects say school officials and students.
“Some classes I would have most likely never taken if I had a choice, and I ended up learning some things that made me view things differently, especially in philosophy and religion classes,” said Judge.
Leave a Reply