Incoming arts and science students in September will be required to fulfill four breadth requirement credits to complete their degrees, instead of three distribution requirement courses.

The changes are a result of the arts and science faculty’s curriculum renewal process, which examines the various principles behind degree requirements’ depth and breadth of study. The previous distribution requirement model was based on how departments were classified rather than the specific content of the courses.

“Some departments thought of themselves, for example, as ‘a social science department’ and so would classify all their courses that way, even if a particular course was similar to one of another department in a different group,” wrote Glen Loney, assistant dean of the arts and science faculty, in an email to The Varsity.

Rather than take one credit in science, humanities, and social science, students entering U of T in September 2010 or after must take one credit from four out of five categories: 1) Creative and Cultural Representations, 2)Thought, Belief, and Behaviour, 3) Society and Its Institutions, 4) Living Things and Their Environment, and 5) The Physical and Mathematical Universes.

“We wanted a set of categories that will spread the many courses we have in Arts & Science across a range that is characteristic of the [faculty], a set that will ensure our students study both sciences and arts in their degree,” said Loney.

Students must take a full course credit in four out of five breadth categories, or a full course credit in three categories and half a credit in each of the other two. The new categories also allow departments to list courses in more than one category. Some departments now have courses in three categories.

According to Loney, deciding on the number of courses generated much discussion.

“We settled on 4.0 courses, realizing that some of these categories—or indeed for some of our students, many of the categories—might be met within a single interdisciplinary program,” Loney said. “We thought that was not a true problem, since if the students were taking a broad range of courses in that program they would indeed be getting a broad education.”

“I think the changes will benefit U of T students,” said Cameron Davis, third-year political science student, “I’ve often found myself wanting to take more courses outside of my discipline, like in human biology and psychology, and this seems like a good opportunity for students such as myself.”