Bachelor's Degree Programs

Bachelor's Degrees
A liberal education emphasizes breadth and balance in developing intellectual resources and cultural perspectives. It encourages the student to achieve the fullest possible development as a person and as a member of so-ciety. It also promotes enlightened citizenship and provides basic preparation for students planning to enter professional or graduate schools or embark on a career. Building on an integrated study foundation, this degree allows a specialized emphasis while at the same time encouraging social responsibility.

The general aspects of the curriculum are designed to enhance the student's capacity for thought and effective expression and facilitate both the expansion and the integration of knowledge. Depth of scholarship is developed in the major field of specialization. The goal of a liberal education is the formulation of a philosophy of life based on knowledge and reflection relevant and appropriate to the contemporary world.

The Bachelor of Arts degree consists of a minimum of 120 credit hours.

The Bachelor of Science degree normally consists of 124 credit hours.

Definitions

Language Requirement
for Students with Majors in the School of Arts and Humanities

The minimal requirement for all students with a major in American Studies, Art, Communication, English, Film Studies, History, Journalism, Music, or Theatre and Dance is one course in a foreign language, normally French, Spanish, or German. Students should complete this requirement as early in their college careers as possible.

Those with two or more years of recent high school study in French, Spanish, or German must enroll in 102 or above. Those with three or more years of recent high school study should enroll in 201 or above. Individual student placements will be verified on the basis of a placement test available to students before they register. Students may also satisfy the requirement through AP or CLEP credit.

Those with near-native fluency in a language should consult Modern Languages faculty for appropriate placement.

Students may also fulfill this requirement by enrolling in a study abroad program in a non-English speaking country, provided the program has been approved by their major department in consultation with the National and International Exchange Center.

Students with documented learning disabilities should apply to the Office of Disability Services and then to the chair of Modern Languages to seek a waiver.

101- to 201-level courses completed to satisfy the language requirement may be applied to the Arts and Humanities component of the Integrative Studies Program.

Integrative Studies Program
Students at Keene State College complete two programs of study to earn a degree – the College's Integrative Studies Program and their major program of study.

Keene State College's Integrative Studies Program purposefully and intentionally helps students develop an understanding of how they and others engage their worlds. The program provides students with the opportunity to develop the skills necessary for success in academics and careers and preserves the breadth of a liberal arts education that enables students to succeed in a global environment. The integrative teaching and learning process approaches teaching and learning in intentionally connected ways.

Students will connect knowledge and skills from multiple sources and experiences, apply knowledge and skills in varied settings, utilize diverse points of view, and learn how to understand issues contextually. Knowledge in both individual and multiple disciplines is the foundation upon which integrative learning builds. Integrative learning often occurs as students put theory into practice, "making meaning" as students apply abstract concepts in practical settings.

Though they are not required as part of the Integrative Studies Program, students should also consider as part of their learning, developing competence in a second language, participating in a study abroad program, and participating in experiential learning in which disciplinary, interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary knowledge can be applied.

Requirements
44 credits minimum

Students complete a total of 44 credits as follows, including a minimum of two courses (8 credits) at the 300 or 400 level. Students may enroll in the upper-level courses once they have completed a minimum of 24 credits of lower-level (100 - 200 level) courses including ITW 101 and IQL 101 in the Integrative Studies Program. The upper-level requirement must be completed at Keene State College. Students are expected to complete ITW 101 within their first two semesters and IQL 101 within their first three semesters. Keene State College students must meet the quantitative literacy requirement. Most students will meet the requirement by successfully completing an IQL 101 course in their first year at Keene State. Students who successfully complete MATH 120, or MATH 141, or MATH 172, or MGT 202 will meet, in lieu of IQL 101, the quantitative literacy requirement. However, IQL 101 courses do not substitute for MATH 120, or MATH 141, or MATH 172, or MGT 202.

Students will complete a total of 44 credits as follows:

1. Foundations
   8 credits

   Essential question:
   How do critical and creative thinking, researching, writing, and evaluating quantitative information inform scholarly endeavors?

   • Thinking and Writing (ITW course prefix)
     4 credits
   • Quantitative Literacy (IQL course prefix)
     4 credits

2. Developing Perspectives and Breadth of Knowledge
   32 credits
   Modes of Inquiry

   Essential questions:
   How are the arts and humanities constructed and defined, and how do they change, shape, provoke, and represent our perceptions and our world?
   What assumptions, methodologies, and theoretical constructs define today's sciences, and how are they used to understand our world?

   Perspectives Distribution
   Four courses in the Arts and Humanities (IA and IH course prefixes)
   16 credits
   Courses must be taken in four different disciplines.

   • Two courses in the Humanities (IH)
   • One course in the Fine and Performing Arts (IA)
   • One additional course in either the Humanities or the Fine and Performing Arts (IH or IA)

   Four courses in the Sciences (IN and IS course prefixes)
   16 credits
   Courses must be taken in four different disciplines.

   • Two courses in the natural sciences (IN)
   • Two courses in the social sciences (IS)

3. Making Connections
   4 credits
   Integrating Modes of Inquiry

   • One course with a cross-disciplinary, multi-disciplinary or interdisciplinary perspective. (II course prefix)
     4 credits

   Essential question:
   How are the skills, concepts, and values developed across disciplines applied to questions fundamental to today's interdependent world?

Integrative Outcomes
The integrative outcomes provide students with the opportunity to learn and discuss overarching themes, perspectives, and paradigms that necessitate their active engagement in the KSC learning environment. In order to achieve this engagement, every course in the Integrative Studies Program must address at least one of the integrative outcomes

Intellectual/Academic Skills Outcomes:
Critical reading and dialogue, writing, quantitative reasoning, critical and creative thinking, information and technological fluency and skills are the skills students use to communicate what they know. These are skills that lay the foundation for both academic and professional success. In the Integrative Studies Program, faculty work with stu-dents to develop these skills at a level commensurate with a baccalaureate degree. They are practiced extensively, across the program, in the context of progressively more challenging problems, projects and expectations.

College Honors Program
The College Honors Program provides academically motivated students with intellectual stimulation and rich experiences for personal and professional growth by offering courses that prepare them to produce exemplary, creative, and challenging work. As an option for meeting the College's liberal arts requirements, it provides an alternative to the Integrative Studies Program and involves both residential and classroom opportunities. In addition to working closely with fellow students and professors to engage in creative and critical inquiry, honors students integrate and expand on what they are learning in Hon-ors courses by participating in enrichment activities and events both on and off campus.

Residential Honors students will be housed in a Living and Learning Community (LLC) in a College residence hall for their first year and may choose to continue in Living and Learning Communities in later years. The director of the College Honors Program serves as the LLC faculty advisor.

A distinctive feature of the College Honors Program is the requirement that students study abroad. Each year travel-study courses led by Keene State College faculty will be made available to sophomore Honors students. See HNRS 301 Global Engagement for details. Honors course requirements cannot be met with Advanced Placement credits or with credits from other institutions.

COLLEGE HONORS PROGRAM
(44 credits)

REQUIRED COURSES:

• HNRSTW 101 Honors Thinking and Writing
• Three Honors Courses (12 credits) in the Arts and Sciences taken from three areas: HNRSA 290 Honors Arts, HNRSH 290 Honors Humanities, HNRSN 290 Honors Natural Sciences, and HNRSS 290 Honors Social Sciences. These Honors courses meet Integrative Studies Program Outcomes and Honors Program outcomes appropriate to the area.
• HNRS 301 Global Engagement
• HNRSI 401 Interdisciplinary Senior Seminar
• Integrative Studies Requirements
  • IQL Quantitative Literacy
  • Four additional Integrative Studies Perspectives courses (16 credits). Students must take one course from each area (Arts, Humanities, Social Sciences, and Natural Sciences)

ADMISSION TO THE COLLEGE HONORS PROGRAM
Students who apply to Keene State College are invited to submit an application and portfolio to the College Honors Program if they have a high school GPA of 3.25 or above. Details of the submission process can be found at the Honors Pro-gram website: http://www.keene.edu/academics/honors/procedure.cfm. A subcommittee of the Honors Program Advisory Committee reviews portfolios and makes decisions on admission.

Beginning in 2011 early in the spring semester, first year non-honors students at Keene State College who have com-pleted between 16 and 28 credits and who have a cumulative GPA of 3.50 will be invited to apply by February15 for admission effective in the fall semester. Students admitted after their first semester need not take an Honors Thinking and Writing course, but will be expected to complete other College Honors Program requirements.

College Honors Program students must maintain a semester grade point average of 3.25 during their first semester. At the end of their second semester, they must have a cumulative GPA of 3.50 in both Honors and non-Honors courses and maintain that in all subsequent semesters in order to graduate with the designation College Honors Program. Students whose GPA falls below 3.25 at the end of the first semester or 3.50 at the end of the second semester will be on Honors probation for the following semester. Those whose semester GPA remains below the standard for two consecutive semesters will be dropped from the Honors Program and will lose Honors scholarship funds. Students have a maximum of two non-consecutive semesters of probation before being dropped from the program.