Students are required to take no fewer than two course credits in the humanities and arts, two course credits in the sciences, and two course credits in the social sciences. In addition to taking courses in these disciplinary areas, students must fulfill skills requirements by completing two course credits in quantitative reasoning, two course credits in writing, and courses to further their language competence. Depending on their initial level of accomplishment in foreign languages, students may fulfill this last requirement with one, two, or three courses or by a combination of course work and approved study abroad.
Courses that fulfill the distributional requirements are designated in chapter III of the YCPS (Subjects of Instruction) by the abbreviations HU, SC, SO, QR, WR, and, for the foreign language requirement, L1, L2, L3, L4, or L5. These designations are assigned to courses by committees appointed by the Dean of Yale College.
New courses are assigned distributional designations as part of the approval process. Following the guidelines given in this section of the Handbook, the DUS should propose designations for new courses in the online Course Proposal Form system. The help files in the online CPF system contain further details. For courses returning to the curriculum after an absence, the DUS should submit proposed designations through the Course Information Management System (CIMS).
Questions regarding distributional designations should be directed to the appropriate committee contact as listed below.
Humanities and Arts: Nancy Woodington, nancy.woodington@yale.edu
Science: Dean William Segraves, sciencecouncil@yale.edu
Social Science: Nancy Woodington, nancy.woodington@yale.edu
Foreign Language: Nelleke Van Deusen-Scholl, nelleke.vandeusen-scholl@yale.edu
Quantitative Reasoning: Dean William Segraves, qrcouncil@yale.edu
Writing: Dean Alfred Guy, alfred.guy@yale.edu
