General Education Requirements

The College and Department sections of this Catalog describe each curriculum leading to a degree. Awarding of an academic degree assumes that the recipient has submitted to rigors of intellectual inquiry, achieved specialized and general knowledge, and acquired motivations and abilities for life-long learning.  The following General Education Requirements support that achievement.

Southeastern’s General Education Requirements (GER) contain two components:

1. A set of courses required in all colleges and majors including 39 credits across six disciplinary areas for baccalaureate degrees as required by the Louisiana Board of Regents.  First-year students also complete two credits of first-year seminar. The first-year seminar is not a Board of Regents general education requirement and is not required of transfer or readmitted Southeastern students with 30 credits or more.

• English Composition (six credits)
• Mathematical/Analytical Reasoning (six credits)
• Natural Sciences (nine credits)
  • 2 courses in biological or physical science area sequence and one in the other area
• Humanities (nine credits)
• Social/Behavioral Sciences (six credits)
• Fine Arts (three credits)
• First-year Seminar (two credits)

Associate degrees require 15 credits across five disciplinary areas as required by the Louisiana Board of Regents.  Requirements include a minimum of three credits of English composition, three credits of Mathematics/Analytical Reasoning, three credits in the Natural Sciences, three credits in the Humanities, and three credits of Social/Behavioral Sciences.

2. A set of NACE (National Association of Colleges and Employers) core competencies integrated into general education courses to cultivate essential skills outside of the specific discipline focused on developing attributes essential for lifelong success in life and career.

• Critical Thinking
• Communication
• Teamwork
• Equity & Inclusion
• Professionalism
• Technology
• Career & Self-Development
• Leadership

These GER establish a broad-based common educational experience designed to enhance students’ abilities to describe, interpret, and analyze their world. In addition to building awareness of a wide range of material and enriching the academic experience, the GER promote intellectual inquiry through basic content and methodology and contribute to the graduate’s ability to communicate effectively in oral and written English.

Each Southeastern Louisiana University baccalaureate degree is designed to help the student progress toward career goals and toward the following goals in general education:

• Students will effectively and intelligently communicate in writing in a variety of contexts.
• Students will demonstrate mathematical and analytical reasoning skills.
• Students will engage in theoretical and empirical study within the natural sciences while gaining an understanding of the nature of science and scientific inquiry. 
• Students will learn to respond critically and imaginatively to how the humanities disciplines have shaped thought and represented the world in the past, and how these disciplines continue to offer perspectives on diverse cultures in the present.
• Students will understand human agency and behavior, the development and structure of social systems, and the impact of culture on human interaction by learning social scientific analytical perspectives and research methodologies.
• Students will explore and value aesthetic creation and form as an essential means of conceiving and expressing the human experience through the fine arts.

The College and Department sections of this catalog describe each curriculum leading to a degree. Each of those degree programs include the completion of the GER. Course options for each area of the GER for baccalaureate degrees are listed below. However, the associate degree and some baccalaureate degrees require students to complete specific courses in certain categories. All students should refer to the major curriculum listed in the College and Department section for information on additional/specific general education requirements for your major.

General Education Requirement - Course List