'We thank Caitlin Kasmar and Rebecca Reimer for their assistance with coding of responses. Order of authors is alphabetical.

Abstract

We describe an integrated program offered in the fall of 1999 to 45 first-year students. The three courses, comprising a normal term's enrollment at our institution, included introductions to biology, philosophy, and psychology. The instructors for the courses met and coordinated their syllabi and assignments for the entire 10-week term, emphasizing a theme common to all three courses, "Origins and Mind." Among the topics common to all three courses were: evolution, sociobiology, adaptation, brain behavior relationships, sensation and perception, innateness, language and communication, and development. Reaction from students is presented and discussed, and compared with reaction from other first-year students enrolled in another section of introductory biology. Results suggest very specific reasons for student enthusiasm.

[114 words]
Origins and Mind: An Integrated Academic Experience for New Students Most colleges and universities specify distribution requirements in their undergraduate curricula. Frequently, such requirements are posited without an explicit rationale that can be readily communicated to students. If such requirements have been in place for a substantial period of time, they often times serve, not as a focal point for curricular discussions, but as simply a part of institutional history. Finally, and for liberal arts institutions in particular, the substantive role such requirements should play in forming an integrating, if not foundational, framework for today's liberally educated mind, is frequently overpowered by the fragmented academic schedules students enroll in.

Our program was an experiment in providing a small group of liberal arts faculty with an opportunity to reflect upon, develop and embody one view of the significance of college-wide requirements in the form of a linking of three courses from three distinct disciplinary divisions. We believed that such an effort would be able to overcome the frequently random course selection practiced by many first-year students and add the value of mutually enhancing disciplinary perspectives that can deepen a first-year student's encounter with an established field of academic inquiry.

We sought to accomplish these goals by building specific curricular links between the humanities, natural sciences and social sciences so that students could see commonalties in questions posed as well as differences in the methods of approach. Faculty from three departments (biology, philosophy, psychology) coordinated their teaching of introductory courses within these fields so as to highlight common themes.
We enrolled the same group of 45 students, who chose this program as an option during
the summer before their arrival. Because a "normal" course load for Carleton students is

three courses during each of three terms, our program comprised their entire academic
program for their first term of college
Our goals in developing this a academic experience included the following:

· To foster a deeper understanding of the connections among diverse disciplines for
students and faculty

· To offer direct exposure to the integration of disciplines through weekly laboratory/discussion sessions attended by all faculty and students

· To offer opportunities for more in-depth and integrative discussions with fellow students outside of class because of the common classroom experience

· To provide participating faculty with the time and space to engage in substantive interdisciplinary discussions about common questions

· To make clearer to students the rationale for our college distribution requirements To provide writing experiences in diverse disciplines that emphasize the development of both writing and critical thinking skills

· To model the integration of laboratory exercises into traditional lecture courses

· To integrate existing courses through faculty discussion and coordination of syllabi rather than develop entirely new courses. Course modifications, if made at all, would be consistent with established departmental goals for introductory courses.

The Specific -Courses

The three courses linked in our "triad" program existed prior to the program. All were taught using texts and assignments "normally" part of the course, with the exception of the biology course, discussed below. The coordination among the three courses occurred in the planning and the rearrangement of topics on the three syllabi, to maximize the temporal contiguity of related themes. A second mechanism for coordination came in the weekly "common time," also described below.

Brief descriptions of the three courses are as follows:

Biology 124: Introductory Biology 2: Diversity, Form, and FunctionAn introduction to the conceptual principles of biology, with emphasis on both the diversity of life and on the ways that organisms have solved the problems common to all living things. Topics include an overview of the major taxonomic groups of organisms, mechanisms and history of evolutionary change, reproduction and life cycles, development of individual organisms, the acquisition and the utilization of both energy and nutrition, and the ecological interactions among species.

Philosophy 110: Evolution and Mind Research in artificial intelligence, biology, psychology, and philosophy has recently combined in an attempt to draw out the implications of the theory of evolution for our understanding of ourselves as cognitive, emotional, and biological entities. This course will focus on examples of both recent and earlier efforts to explain the mind within an
evolutionary framework. Topics to be treated include: the evolution and design of the mind, the evolution of language, the significance of emotions, and the nature of culture. Readings will be chosen from texts by Darwin, Nietzsche, and Freud and writings of such contemporary authors as the philosopher Daniel Dennett and the linguist Steven Pinker.

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