Quantitative Reasoning All students admitted to the College for the Fall Term of 1994 and thereafter must meet the Quantitative Reasoning (QR) requirement. The goal of this requirement is to ensure that every graduate of the College achieves a certain level of proficiency in using and analyzing quantitative information. Students may fulfill this requirement either by: successfully completing one course (of 3 units or more) designated for full QR credit (QR/1); or successfully completing two courses (at least one of which must be of 3 units or more) designated for half QR credit (QR/2).   QR courses may come from a wide range of disciplines representing the natural and social sciences, as well as some areas of the humanities. Quantitative reasoning is first and foremost reasoning. It is not mathematical manipulation or computation, but rather the methodology used to analyze quantitative information to make decisions, judgments, and predictions. It involves defining a problem by means of numerical or geometrical representations of real-world phenomena, determining how to solve it, deducing consequences, formulating alternatives, and predicting outcomes. Advanced Placement (AP) courses may not be used to satisfy the Quantitative Reasoning requirement. Courses transferred from another college or university do not generally carry QR credit, except in the following circumstances: (1) QR is considered fulfilled for all science, math, and computer science concentrators who transfer in the prerequisites; (2) Transfer credit for Physics 125, 126, 140, 240 and any statistics course receive (QR/1) credit. Courses used to satisfy the QR requirement may also serve to satisfy other College requirements; e.g., students who are working towards an A.B. or B.S. degree may elect a QR course that also counts toward meeting the Area Distribution, Concentration, or other College requirement.   Race & Ethnicity The LS&A faculty added the Race & Ethnicity requirement in 1991 after long and thoughtful discussion. The faculty believes that because racial and ethnic intolerance has fundamentally affected the development of contemporary American society and because its effects will continue to be felt well into the future, all students should take at least one course that deals on a fairly sophisticated level with topics such as the historical development of racism, and the social, political, and economic effects of racism and other types of discrimination. In an article for the Spring, 1991 edition of LSAmagazine, former LS&A Dean Goldenberg wrote that the faculty "agreed that racism is an urgent problem facing the University and society at large and that it is desirable that courses in the College address questions of race and ethnicity and teach students to think analytically and critically about such topics.... The aim [of the requirement] is to provide students with relevant information about an important social issue since the changing world and work-place the student will enter will require being better able to listen to and understand a diversity of voices." Courses approved to meet the Race & Ethnicity requirement will address issues arising from racial or ethnic intolerance. In approving the requirement, the faculty of the College made the following statements: Required content. All courses satisfying the requirement must provide discussion, consistent with disciplinary approaches, of: the meaning of race, ethnicity, and racism; racial and ethnic intolerance and resulting inequality as it occurs in the United States or elsewhere; comparisons of discrimination based on race, ethnicity, religion, social class, or gender. Required focus. Every course satisfying the requirement must devote substantial, but not necessarily exclusive, attention to the required content. Courses may meet this requirement by various means consistent with disciplines or fields of study, and faculty members from all departments are urged to think creatively about how their fields might contribute to the requirement. Although it is hoped that many of these courses will focus on the United States, it is not required that they do so. Courses that deal with these issues in other societies, or that study them comparatively, may also meet the requirement. Students who are new to the College of LS&A (that is, first time enrolled as an LS&A student) in the Fall Term of 1991, and thereafter, must (in any term before graduation) receive credit for one of the approved Race & Ethnicity (R&E) courses. The College offers many courses taught by a number of different departments each term. Although the list of courses that meet this requirement varies from term to term, all such courses are designed to give students exposure to questions focusing on the meaning of race and racism, racial and ethnic intolerance and resulting inequality, and comparisons with other types of discrimination. Courses are approved on a term-by-term basis, and a list appears each term on the Student Academic Affairs webiste (http://www.lsa.umich.edu/saa/). It is most important that you are careful to elect the section of the course taught by the faculty member whose name is listed with the course. Other sections of the course have not been approved to meet this requirement and may not be substituted. Courses meeting the R&E requirement may also help meet either distribution or concentration or composition requirements. Advanced Placement credit can not be used to meet this requirement. University of Michigan | College of LS&A | Student Academic Affairs This page maintained by LS&A Academic Information and Publications, 1228 Angell Hall Copyright © 2000 The Regents of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109 USA +1 734 764-1817 Trademarks of the University of Michigan may not be electronically or otherwise altered or separated from this document or used for any non-University purpose.