<p>Do any recent alums have recommendations on "must take" courses and/or professors for entering freshmen?</p>
<p>Tim Burke will have a First Year Seminar.
Tierney will be on leave and Schuldenfrei just officially retired, sadly enough.</p>
<p>The key: Unless you plan to REALLY focus on one department and try to rush into higher tier classes, professors matter a lot more.</p>
<p>it helps to know what you're interested in :)</p>
<p>one class I would recommend to everyone is Syntax w/ Donna Jo Napoli - even if you've never had a linguistics class before (probable) it's quite enjoyable, and she's an easy grader too (of course you're pass/fail so it doesn't matter anyway)</p>
<p>Some professors I've enjoyed and who have strong reputations in the Social Sciences/Humanities:</p>
<p>Alison Dorsey
Anthony Foy
Bakirathi Mani
Braulio Munoz
Farha Ghannam
Tariq Al-Jamil
Pieter Judson
Mark Wallace (a gift from God/quite possibly the kindest person on campus)</p>
<p>Also, you should take African Dance (you can take it for either PE or academic credit). The instructor is excellent and blends philosophy and technique seamlessly making for a truly holistic dance experience. No experience required.</p>
<p>Wow, what a list!! Thank you!</p>
<p>They posted the list of available first-year seminars! Does anyone have an opinion on which of the following might be most incredible? History definitely interests me a lot, but I don't know about that of leisure or play. Is Burke worth it?</p>
<p>Munoz: Intro to Contemporary Soc Thought
Wallace: Religion and the Meaning of Life
Burke: History of Leisure and Play</p>
<p>If anyone has any fervent opinions about any of the other courses offered I'd love to hear them! ...For example, is Battling Against Voldemort entirely useless? I'm quite certain almost anything would be incredible. Personally, I'm most interested in the social sciences, although I'm sure others would like to hear other recommendations.</p>
<p>Burke is definitely worth it--not to mention he will be on sabbatical second semester, so this is a good opportunity. He puts so much thought into his syllabi--and this course looks really interesting. I'm sure my D is wishing she were a freshman again so she could take it!</p>
<p>Here is the syllabus for Burke's first-year seminar,</p>
<p>History 1L The History of Play and Leisure
1st-year seminar
Professor Burke
Swarthmore College</p>
<p>Easily</a> Distracted History 1L The History of Play and Leisure, Spring 2008</p>
<p>I would want to take it because:</p>
<p>a) He is one of Swarthmore's most loved professors. Scary smart and very engaged with his teaching and students.</p>
<p>b) Looking at the syllabus, he uses the seminar as a vehicle to teach the basic building-blocks of college academics -- reading for discussion, skimming, forming arguments, writing academic papers. He's really good at communicating about this kind of thing.</p>
<p>Now, as a practical matter, there are 360 some first year students and each of these seminars is limited in enrollment. So it is a sure bet that many of these, including Burke's for sure, will be "lotteried". The strategy for incoming students is to assume that all of these first year seminars will be eye-opening in their own way and go into registration with a list of three to five that you would like to take, paying particular attention to some that might be less popular. My daughter took a FYS in a department she had never considered and ended up majoring in the department.</p>
<p>Looking at the list: Cothren's *Making Art History *will be fantastic. He's another real favorite. Also, don't overlook the FYS version of the Insights into Academic Writing. This is your basic college writing course. This might be a good fallback.</p>
<p>BTW, you can get a better list with clickable links to the course catalog descriptions by going to the Tri-Co course search engine:</p>
<p>TriCollege</a> Course Guide</p>
<p>Click "Swarthmore" and "Fall 2008" and "Spring 2009". Select nothing else, but enter "FYS" in the keyword box. This returns the same listing as the PDF above.</p>
<p>Do the freshman take only one FYS? Or multiple ones in different departments? Can a student take a FYS in the English dept and one in the History dept? Also, how does the lottery system work for seminars?</p>
<p>My daughter ended up taking at least two FYS, one first semester and another second semester, if I recall -- plus the seminar format Physics course that wasn't called an FYS, but met once a week with 12 students. I can't remember how it all worked. I know she was lotteried out of several of her top choices, but ended up in a first semester seminar (one of the backup options she carried into registration) that she really, really liked. The one she took second semester was in the same department. I think she had a stat course in the Math department that was cross-listed in that department as well, so by pure serendipity she ended up being nearly halfway to a major at the end of freshman year. </p>
<p>Like all the lotteries at Swarthmore, there are rules to ensure equal access. So, if you've been shut out of a FYS, you would have dibs in the next lottery over someone who already had gotten into an FYS.</p>
<p>As for lotteries. Everyone pre-registers. If there are more registrations than slots in the course, the course goes to lottery. If you've already been lotteried out of that course, you would have dibs and go to the head of the line. Once all the "dibs" scenarios are out of the way, it's just pure chance who gets the course and who doesn't.</p>
<p>My practical advice. Go into registration with some backup plans in your pocket and stay flexible. If you get lottiered out of a course, no big deal...you then have first dibs on the course next time, so take something else from your list. It is always a good idea to have a couple of backups that you know aren't going to be that popular or fill to the limit. For example, some of the versions of intro pre-req courses in English and Poli Sci will be more popular than others (based on the professor, the topic, or how early in the morning the class meets). The reason you want to stay flexible is that your schedule has four moving parts. If you go to a backup course for one part, that may change your available time slots for another course, forcing a change from one professor's section to another. Don't drive yourself crazy with every last detail of a schedule this summer, but spend some time with the course catalog so you have a list of "hmmmm..that looks like an interesting course to take sometime" options to let you react on the fly. For example, my daugther was the first person in Swarthmore history to get lotteried out of all four sections of the intro writing course fall semester her first year. That threw her entire schedule planning into disarray. it worked out fine...she had first dibs on the spring semester version of the course which was taught by the head of the writing department (who teaches the advanced WA course in the fall).</p>
<p>I took two FYSs, one each semester - basically, you're guaranteed entry into one (although not necessarily your first choice, and most aren't offered both semesters), and if you can manage to get into another (lottery luck, underenrollment, whatever), you can take more. My first was lotteried and I got in, and the second (capped at 12) only had 12 pre-enrolled. Good luck for me, I guess! You can register for any of the courses in any department (mine were Sociology & Anthropology and History). It can also help to talk to professors before registering for a class - if you can manage doing so during the insanity that is orientation, I would definitely suggest that.</p>