First-Year Seminar

Words and Numbers are your first-year seminar classes. At Lewis & Clark, you’ll take one faculty-led foundational seminar per semester. These small classes (19–25 students) are designed to help you develop the reading, writing, discussion, and analytical skills you will need to succeed in college and for life. One of your two courses will focus on interpreting the meaning and significance of texts (CORE 120: Words), the other on interpreting quantitative information and models (CORE 121: Numbers). These are not simply writing and math classes; rather, these courses allow you to explore a specialized topic of particular interest with a faculty member and a small group of students.

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Words teaches students to explore the meaning and significance of texts via close reading and analysis, and to express that analysis in writing.

Numbers teaches students to interpret quantitative information presented in various forms and contexts; to understand the logical structure of quantitative arguments; and to use quantitative models, theories, and data to simplify, explain, and make predictions.

Colloquium Series Info

Learn More About Our Writing Center

The Lewis & Clark writing center offers guidance on everything from the most basic components of style and grammar to your highest aspirations to clarity, elegance, and originality.
Watch Last Year’s Kick-Off Lecture

This lecture from Fall 2019 explores issues of critical thinking and encourage learning to see different sides of an argument.