Between 2000 BCE and 300 CE, cultures with lasting impact flourished all around the world. In this course, you will learn about the daily life, social structures, governments, economies, and religions of these cultures, and consider how traces of them live on today. You and your classmates will read historical accounts of ancient societies and explore myths, legends, and arts.

Develop your writing style and study advanced English mechanics in this rigorous grammar course. Guided by a college-level textbook and multicultural reading excerpts, you will deepen your understanding of grammatical structure, applying concepts like subject/verb agreement, parallelism, sentence boundaries, passive and active voice, consistent verb tense, and pronoun usage while collaborating with classmates in asynchronous peer review workshops. You will also participate in written discussion forums that explore responsible readership and literary representation.

If you love to read, write, and talk about books, this is the course for you. In this course, you'll join a literary community and develop our vocabulary, close-reading, and critical thinking skills through workshops, where you’ll read short stories or novels, respond to them in our journals, and discuss as a class. Then you’ll learn and practice what professional writers do: decide on topics, gather material, talk about creative choices with peers, and draft, workshop, and revise works of creative fiction.

In this course, you will become familiar with traditional Greek myths and examine how modern authors draw upon Greek sources to create exciting new adventures. Along the way, you will learn critical reading skills, write persuasive arguments, and even create your own short stories! Your instructor will guide and challenge you with individualized weekly feedback. Persuasive writing assignments will push you to make inferences, evaluate arguments, and learn to use credible evidence to support your claims.

Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes stated that the law is both a mirror and a motor for society. The most notorious trials frequently go well beyond a specific case to reflect deeper truths about America. Simultaneously, decisions can drive both legal and social thinking in new directions. This history course examines famous cases in their historical, political, and social contexts. It explores Marbury v. Madison within the framework of the early Federalist period;  Dred Scott v. Sanford within the context of rising political fragmentation; Lochner v.

This course covers material ordinarily included in a year-long introductory course in high school biology, typically a prerequisite for AP® or IB Biology. We’ll begin with the smallest unit, the atom, and build toward discussions of ecology and the environment. Along the way, we’ll sample biochemistry, genetics, and cellular processes, and integrate these concepts into our studies of evolution and systems of living things, such as respiration and reproduction. Through readings, lectures, and lab work, you’ll finish the course with a strong foundation in biological concepts.

SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, is about 100nm in size but has caused a global pandemic. How can something so small cause so much damage? Explore different types of viruses and bacteria, learning how pathogens have cohabitated with human beings throughout history. Discover why some microorganisms are helpful, how others infect their hosts to cause trouble, and why many are so difficult to understand.

One look at classic anatomical sketches such as Leonardo da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man, created from the artist’s meticulous observations of dissected cadavers, can inspire a deep interest in the body and how it works. Doctors and scientists continue to discover new information about how bodies function. This course surveys the human body’s immune, integumentary, skeletal, muscular, nervous, endocrine, cardiovascular, lymphatic, respiratory, digestive, excretory, and reproductive systems—paying special attention to cells and tissues.

Ninety-four percent of life on Earth is aquatic, yet we have only explored 5 percent of the planet's oceans. Marine ecologists aim to reduce this knowledge gap while using biology, chemistry, physics, geology, geography, and meteorology to study oceans and the hundreds of thousands of known species that live below their surface.

How can cats see in the dark? How can snakes smell with their tongues? How do optical illusions “trick” the brain? You’ll answer these questions while exploring the anatomy and physiology of the nervous system and the way different organisms’ brains process sensory information in order to experience their surroundings. You’ll learn about sensory abilities that humans don’t have, like electric organs and sonar navigation. In the lab, you and your classmates will dissect organs like a sheep’s brain and a cow’s eye to explore how senses relate to functionality.