A proposal for a new core curriculum was approved at a Westchester Faculty Council (WFC) meeting this past month. Going into effect for the 2026-27 academic years, this new core will remove Area of Knowledge (AOK) courses and in-depth sequences, instead having students complete three Arts and Humanities (A&H) courses as well as three Natural and Social Sciences (NSS) courses. These courses must be outside of the student’s major, with few exceptions.
These changes will be implemented only for incoming students in the Fall of 2026. Current students will keep the same requirements they have, unless they choose to opt in.
Luke Cantarella, a professor at the New York City campus and Department Chairperson of the Dyson College, explains the reasons behind implementing this change.
“It is important that the core is easy for students to navigate and complete within their four-year course of study,” Cantarella said. “This change simplifies the core and offers more classes that can fulfill the general education requirements while maintaining the same learning outcomes.”
Currently, AOK requirements entail a student to look for specific courses under the AOK attribute. Now, incoming students can search by department to fulfill the A&H and NSS requirements. To make the requirement easier to fulfill, the number of classes needed to take will drop from eight to six. Transfer students will now need 38 credits as opposed to 44.
There are a few exceptions to these new guidelines, as Matthew Aiello-Lammens, professor and Chair of the Westchester Faculty Council points out.
“There are a couple of programs that are interdisciplinary, and they’re kind of not clear how those will get sorted out just yet,” Aiello-Lammens said. “We do know the INT courses will have to identify which bucket they want to be in.”
An additional goal of the new core is to highlight the importance of liberal arts and sciences.
“The change to the core should allow students to engage in liberal arts and sciences early during the time at Pace and have more options to study subjects that they are curious about,” Cantarella said.
Additionally, a new seminar-based UNV101 starting running this fall that combines liberal arts courses with the traditional UNV101 content.
These changes will be implemented to incoming students at Pace, and within a few years, AOKs will have been fully phased out of the university’s curriculum.