About the Program

The UC Davis First-Year Seminar Program was established in 1988 to give first-year students an opportunity to interact directly with faculty members in examining ideas of substance and consequence. Instructors choose seminar topics to reflect their current intellectual interests and to illustrate forms of inquiry and reasoning that form the foundation of the research university. The small size and interdisciplinary nature of the seminars foster intense intellectual exchange between students and instructor and among students themselves. Though varied in form and content, seminar discussions and assignments help students to sharpen their critical reasoning skills and to engage with fellow students as intellectual colleagues.

Program Specifics

Seminar Topics: Diverse. Defined by expertise and interests of individual instructors.

Enrollment: Limited to 19 students.

Number of Seminars:  200 seminars each year.

Grading: Either pass/no pass or traditional letter grading.

Credit: One or two units. One-unit seminars meet for 10 hours during the academic quarter; two-unit seminars meet for 20 hours.

Enrollment Priority: Priority is given to students with fewer than 45 quarter units. After the second registration pass appointments, students with more than 45 units will be admitted to most seminars.

Limit per Student: Students may receive credit for only one First-Year Seminar per quarter.

Location: Campus seminar room, departmental conference room, or non-traditional setting.

Instructors: Anyone who holds an instructional appointment at UC Davis is eligible to teach a First-Year Seminar, including all members of the Academic Senate and all Lecturers, Lecturer Supervisors, Visiting and Adjunct Professors and Emeriti Professors. For more information about teaching or proposing a seminar, see: Information for Faculty.

Program Administration: The First-Year Seminar Program is administered by the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning for the Vice-Provost–Undergraduate Studies and in consultation with the First-Year Seminar Faculty Review Committee.

For More Information

For more information about the First-Year Seminar program, contact the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning at cetl@ucdavis.edu or 530-752-1772, or follow the links under the “First-Year Seminars” tab above.