General Education Program

General Education at USF St. Petersburg

Consistent with the Mission of the University the General Education Committee has developed the following philosophical statement.

Philosophical Statement

A liberal arts education transcends any particular course of study. It inspires and fosters reflective skills and ways of looking at the world, and one’s place in it, that may not otherwise be introduced during a student’s course of study within her or his discipline. 

Liberal arts education is associated with human interaction in all its varied dimensions. It enhances the capability to relate to people, to events, to the physical and biological world, and to various ways of learning about the world.

Liberal arts education is inclusive in that it crosses the boundaries among disciplines and between “learning as an end in itself” and “education for the purpose of developing a career.” Academic inquiry in all disciplines, whether intellectual, practical, scientific, or aesthetic, contain perspectives that allow for more than one interpretation. Acquiring a liberal arts education entails awareness of the multiple interpretations of the world in its diverse dimensions.

The underlying themes of General Education at USF St. Petersburg are:

Valuing a process of learning that inspires curiosity and creativity, through exposure to and understanding divergent intellectual traditions and their associated value systems.

Fostering an ability to think critically, solve problems and synthesize ideas and perspectives, in the process of intellectual exploration and development.

Goals of a Liberal Arts Education at USF St. Petersburg

The general education requirements are the core of USF St. Petersburg’s liberal arts curriculum. Divided into nine areas of knowledge, the general education course requirements, taken over thirty-six semester hours, provide an opportunity for each student to obtain the critical components of a Liberal Arts education.

The USFSP General Education curriculum seeks to provide students with a coherent, purposeful direction of study. An extensive liberal arts education is gained by the students as they follow a course of study that includes a diverse array of inquiry: English Composition, Quantitative Methods, Natural Sciences, Social Sciences, Historical, Fine Arts, and Global Perspectives on Non-Western Cultures (ALAMEA).

Liberal Arts Requirements

Students will complete 45 semester hours to satisfy the Liberal Arts Requirements. Thirty-six (36) semester hours will satisfy the general education course requirement, and nine (9) semester hours will satisfy the exit requirements. These requirements are distributed as follows: