New Freshman Academic Advisement

Step 3: Creating your Fall Course Request

Show me choices for an Exploratory semester

Not knowing what you want your major to be is not unusual for first year students.  In high school, you are introduced to only a handful of the possible areas of study that are available at the University at Albany, and it is important to have the freedom to explore in your first year.

Remember that following a Major Academic Pathway (MAP) at this time does not prevent you from changing directions in the future.

However, if none of the MAPs in Step 2 reflect your interests, you can use one of the Exploratory Semesters that we have created to request coursework that gives you the opportunity to learn more about general academic areas, while satisfying graduation requirements.  We have grouped the Exploratory Semesters into the main subject areas that are taught at UAlbany. 

The three options for Exploratory Semesters are listed below.  Once you have decided which one best matches your interests, please click the link at the bottom of the screen to create your Course Request Form.

The Course Request Form will assist you in choosing appropriate courses, based on these Exploratory Semester options.  For example, a student choosing the Humanities and the Arts Exploratory Semester will be prompted to choose 5 courses of interest from each General Education category listed: Humanities, Arts, Social Science, Global+Cross Cultural Studies, as well as Electives. 

There is a link to the course descriptions for all available classes, at the top of the Course Request Form.  You should use this link to fully explore your course options before making final decisions.

To be sure that the advisor creating your course schedule has all the necessary information to prepare an appropriate schedule for you, the Course Request Form requires that you complete each question/section fully.  In this example, if you select only four classes in the Arts category, your form will not transmit successfully, and will direct you back to select a fifth class.

Click here to see a sample Exploratory semester Course Request Form at the Final Review stage.