Core Curriculum

The Core Curriculum addresses the introductory-level learning outcomes of a Naropa education, which are outlined in the Six Essential Learning Outcomes. Designed to develop both breadth and depth of study, the Core Curriculum will prepare you for deepened scholarship in your chosen major.

Undergraduate Core Requirements

The Core Curriculum  is comprised of a series of Core Seminars and Core Area Requirements. The Core Seminars serve to initiate a depth of learning within the foundational realms of diversity, sustainability, writing, and contemplative practice and insight. Whereas, the Core Area Requirements serve to complement this depth by expanding the breadth of one’s learning through thematic investigation across the disciplines. Through the depth and breadth of the Core Curriculum, you are exposed to the unique benefits of contemplative inquiry while immersed in a liberal arts education. See the course catalog for details.

The Six Essential Learning Outcomes of the Undergraduate Core Curriculum

1. Critical Thinking (Disruptive Scholarship)
   Students demonstrate reflexive and discourse community analysis, incorporating diverse perspectives, toward critiquing (and disrupting) normative thinking, theories, or praxis.

2. Non-conceptual Knowing (Embodied Presence)
   Students access and embody direct experience.

3. Complexity (Radical Interdependence)
   Students identify the interdependent nature of experience.

4. Resilience (Rigorous Flexibility)
   Students generate flexibility in response to challenge or change.

5. Compassion (Spiritual Warriorship)
   Students apply emotional literacy in the cultivation of compassionate action.

6. Innovation (Creative Action)
   Students apply creativity to problem-solving.

Naropa College

Naropa College is a collective of faculty and staff dedicated to fostering a vibrant and integrated undergraduate degree experience. Naropa College oversees the Core Curriculum and collaborates with the academic departments and campus partners to support each student on their unique learning journey, from orientation to graduation. 

An Invitation

Naropa College invites you to be courageous—to explore what it means to be truly human—to renew and deepen your connection with the natural world and society; to provoke and sharpen your intellect; to develop your sense perceptions; and to nurture your inherent wisdom and compassion. By engaging scholarship with an unbiased openness to your present experience, you may become fearlessness enough to uplift the world without aggression and allow the gift of your precious human life to have beneficial impact on others.