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Spartan Early Start 2024 Course SelectionStudents gathered around a computer in a discussion

Eligible students can select one or two of the classes below to enter in their SES application. You can view a PDF of the application before you apply. All classes run during MSU’s second summer session, which starts July 1, 2024, and ends August 15, 2024. Availability in the course depends on if there are open seats, which change regularly.

When making decisions, please review the information on the FAQ page and consider the AP, Dual Enrollment, transfer, or other credits you are transferring in to MSU. You may also want to review MSU’s Class Search page in your student portal for additional details about the course.

If you have questions about course selection, please consult your college advisor, email the SES team, and/or view MSU’s advanced credits or transfer information websites. You can also reference the SES 2024 college guides for recommended courses.

When reviewing the courses below, please note the organization of the course information below as you make your decisions:

  1. First, the classes are organized alphabetically by MSU College, then alphabetically by course subject codes within the college. For example, College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, and ABM, which is the course subject code for the Agribusiness Management program.
  2. For each specific course listing under the MSU College heading, you will see the course code, course number, and section number; then the title; and then credits. You need most of this information when you apply. For example, ABM 130, section 731.
  3. Then, you will see a course description. Note that some courses have specific themes for each section, specifically IAH, ISS, and UGS courses.
  4. Fourth, we state the course modality. All classes are online, and most are asynchronous (you do not need to meet at a specific time each week). A few are synchronous (you need to meet online at a specific day and time) or have optional synchronous components. Some of the courses associated with College bridge programs require some time on campus.
  5. Finally, we provide notes for the class related to who can take the course, suggested academic backgrounds, any prerequisites, and restrictions.

Jump to a College:

Course Guides

 


COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE & NATURAL RESOURCES

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  • Course description: Organization and operation of the agri-food system. Economic analysis of agri-food firms and consumers. Management functions and decision-making of agri-food firms.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Description and analysis of world food, population and poverty problems. Interrelationships between developed and developing countries.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • AFRE 100, AFRE 265, or EC 201 (microeconomics course) as prereqs
  • Course description: Researching agri-food issues, food industry business environments, and agri-food industry trends. Information gathering. Electronic library reference sources. Synthesis of data and information into market intelligence.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Relationship between the economy and the natural environment. Economic organization and sustainability. Economic concepts applied to natural resources and agriculture.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Recommended background in economics, or concurrent enrollment in EC 201
  • Course description: Regulation, laws, compliance and safety as it relates to Michigan’s agricultural sector. Michigan Occupational Safety and Health Administration safety standards, food safety, water protection, pesticide and fertilizer application and voluntary programs for agricultural producers. Preparation for the pesticide core exam.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Ag Tech students only
  • Course description: Role of turf in society and the environment. Principles underlying establishment and maintenance of turf on athletic fields, parks, home lawns, and golf courses. Aesthetic, safety, and economic aspects of turfgrass management practices.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Turf grass identification. Site analysis and recommendations. On campus facility and venue visits. Mowing equipment and practices. Turf establishment. Soil cultivation and amendments. Fertilizer and pest management.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Introduction to sustainability and personal role in sustainability initiatives. Implications of individual actions for key sustainability challenges. Application of sustainability principles and leadership skills in community.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Theories, concepts and themes in international development and sustainability.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Nature of pests and their impact on society. Principles of integrated pest management in relation to environmental quality and sustainable development.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Application of nutritional science to personal health and every-day life. Tools, strategies, and resources related to personal diet, nutrition, and wellness.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Nutrient function and metabolism. Food and nutrients in health and disease. Socioeconomic and environmental influences on food and health. Incorporation of healthy food choices into daily living.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None

COLLEGE OF ARTS & LETTERS

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  • Course description: Survey of visual communication. Social, global and technological developments in graphic design as it relates to art historical movements and other design disciplines. Typography of printed and digital work from 1880 to present.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Introductory survey of Western Art from the Paleolithic to the Medieval era. Key works, monuments, and stylistic trends.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: The study and practice of invention, arrangement, revision, style, and delivery to help students make successful transitions to writing, reading, and researching in higher education.
  • Section theme: Hip Hop in Eastern Europe and Russia.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
    • Fulfills first of two University requirements in Arts and Humanities
    • Special section for Honors College and Academic Scholars students only
    • Not suggested for RCAH and TE students.
  • Course description: Analyze diverse forms of culture from Italy and from other countries where Italian is spoken. Read and discuss written and audiovisual materials such as Italian newspapers, films, and TV, among others. Course is conducted in English, but some primary materials are in Italian. Basic introduction in Italian to understand primary materials.
  • Section theme: Made in Italy — From Italian gastronomy to high-end fashion, to luxury sports vehicles, the made in Italy seal is as much about understanding Italian culture as it is recognizing the quality of its products. This course will examine the historical and cultural significance of the made in Italy seal while analyzing the global demand for Italian products.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Should have writing requirement done
  • Course description: A survey of historic and contemporary philosophical traditions from Indigenous peoples globally.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Husserl, Jaspers, Kierkegaard, Marcel, Nietzsche, Sartre, and de Beauvoir. Topics such as hope, anxiety, bad faith, subjectivity, freedom, social being, phenomenological method.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: History of social and political philosophy; problems such as obligation, power, oppression, freedom, equality, and community.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Recommended that students have one previous course in philosophy
  • Course description: Conceptual and normative issues in feminist theory. Topics such as sexism, oppression, coercion, control, power, equality, personhood, respect and self-respect, rape, separatism, community, intimacy, and autonomy.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Recommended that students have one previous course in philosophy
  • Course description: History, themes and issues in the intersection of religion, philanthropy, and nonprofit organizations in U.S. and global contexts.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course descriptions: The study and practice of invention, arrangement, revision, style, and delivery to help students make successful transitions to writing, reading, and researching in higher education.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
    • SES students only
    • Fulfills University first-year writing requirement
    • Not suggested for Honors and Residential College students

COLLEGE OF COMMUNICATION ARTS & SCIENCES

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  • Course description: Advertising problems from the perspective of managers responsible for solving problems. Identify problems, develop alternative solutions, implement effective strategies, and evaluate proposed solutions.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Transfer Students ONLY
  • Course description: Theory and practice for utilizing creative and critical thinking skills to generate unique ideas to solve complex problems and generate unique media content.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Couse description: Essential techniques for capturing, processing and outputting digital images in media settings.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Varied topics pertaining to the study of communication applications and processes. This section is designed for incoming students in Communication Arts and Sciences as part of the Ignite Program.
  • Section theme: Open to incoming Communication Arts and Sciences program in the MSU Ignite program, intended to support students’ transition from high school to college and allow them to learn more about our academic programs in Communication Arts and Sciences.
  • Modality: Hybrid, synchronous class dates: Sunday, July 9th – Friday, July 14, 2023, with additional class dates over Zoom through out the remainder of the 2nd summer session
  • Restrictions/Notes:
  • Course description: Process and functions of communication. Principles underlying communication behavior. Practice in analyzing communication situations and in speaking and writing.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
    • SES students only
  • Course description: Principles and practices of interpersonal communication. Emphasis on effective and responsible interpersonal communication.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Transfer Students ONLY
  • Course description: Introduction to today’s media coverage of sports, including college and professional major and Olympic sports. Survey of development of traditional and new media reporting. Legal, and ethical issues, including contracts and copyrights of sports media.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Must have writing requirement done
    • Transfer Students ONLY
  • Course description: Creation of digital stop motion animation sequences to tell a narrative story or recreate a historical or current world event. History of stop motion animation, character rigging and kinetics, storyboarding, plot and sequence development.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Must have writing requirement done
    • Transfer Students ONLY
  • Course description: Development of journalism in the United States from colonial to the present; examination of evolving written, aural, visual and multimedia forms and relevant media technology. Journalism’s history has impacted and influenced U.S. history in interesting ways.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Transfer Students ONLY
  • Course description: Overview and critique of concepts of information, the history of computing and information, uses and effects of information technology, information management, and human-centered approaches to designing information systems.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Transfer Students ONLY

COLLEGE OF EDUCATION

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  • Course description: Theories and issues in psychological adjustment. Dynamics operating within individuals and in their interactions with others. Implications for learning, development, and well-being.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
  • Course description: Understanding self, schools, and society; emphasizing racial justice, equity, and social identity markers.
  • Modality: In person, bridge program
  • Restrictions/Notes:

LYMAN BRIGGS COLLEGE

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  • Course description: Medical terminology, focusing on human systems, anatomy and physiology, fundamental word building principles, and phonetic pronunciations.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Recommended background in physiology
    • Juniors and seniors only
  • Course description: Number systems; functions and relations; exponents and logarithms; elementary theory of equations; inequalities; and systems of equations.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous with synchronous options
  • Restrictions/Notes:

COLLEGE OF NATURAL SCIENCE

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  • Course description: Historical and recent development of ideas about behavior, ecological, and evolutionary processes. Critical evaluation of the use and misuse of human understanding of nature, emphasizing recent findings.
  • Section theme: An interdisciplinary study of sciences that explores a body of knowledge and how that knowledge informs and shapes our society.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
    • SES students only
    • Fulfills University biological science requirement for some majors
    • Not appropriate for STEM majors
  • Course description: Science as a way of knowing about natural and anthropogenic global change. Implications for societies.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous; There is a face-to-face component that will take place over Zoom on a scheduled weekly basis. This live Zoom webinar will discuss the course material and concepts and allow for an interactive discussion among the students and instructor. The live webinar will be recorded for later review if necessary.
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Fulfills physical science University requirement for some majors
    • Not appropriate for STEM majors
    • Requires a MTH or STT class as prereq
  • Course description: Quantitative literacy including applications to health and risk, science, and the environment.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
    • Not appropriate for STEM majors nor majors that require higher-level math.
  • Course description: Separable and exact equations. Linear equations and variation of parameters. Higher order linear equations. Laplace transforms. Systems of first-order linear equations. Introduction to partial differential equations and Fourier series.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Eligible based on placement score or transfer credit
  • Course description: Matrices, systems of linear equations, vector spaces, linear transformations, inner products and orthogonal spaces, eigenvalues and eigenvectors, and applications to geometry. A writing course with emphasis on proofs.
  • Modality: Online, synchronous; Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday from 10:20 to 12:10 p.m.
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Eligible based on placement score or transfer credit
  • Course description: Convergence of sequences and series. Upper and lower limits, completeness, limits and continuity. Derivatives. Uniform convergence.
  • Modality: Online, synchronous; Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday from 10:20 to 12:10 p.m.
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Eligible based on placement score or transfer credit
  • Course description: Plant structure, function, development, genetics, diversity and ecology.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous with synchronous options
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • SES students only
  • Course description: Parameter estimation, sampling distributions, confidence intervals, hypothesis testing, simple and multiple regression, analysis of variance. Time series models, data analysis and forecasting.
  • Modality: Online, synchronous; Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 12:40 – 2:30 p.m.
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Eligible based on placement score or transfer credit

COLLEGE OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

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  • Course description: Origins and diversity of cultural systems. Theories of culture. Patterns of kinship. Religious, economic, and political institutions.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Theory, methodology, and techniques of archaeology. Applications to questions about past human behavior. History and concepts of archaeology as an anthropological subdiscipline.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
  • Course description: Concepts, methods and theoretical approaches of the field of medical anthropology.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
  • Course description: Problems, data, and methods of physical anthropology. Human genetics, hominid evolution, primate studies, human osteology, and human diversity.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
  • Course description: Great discoveries in archaeology that have captured the public’s imagination and shaped Western thought, from Olduvai Gorge and Stonehenge to Macchu Pichu.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Cross cultural perspectives on the health implications of differing life circumstances for women. Women as health-care consumers and providers. Health and women’s life cycles.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: How social movements within different cultures around the world organize, create or impede change on the basis of class, religion, race, ethnicity, language, and territory.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Understanding race and ethnicity. Models analyzing racial, ethnic, and national identities; boundaries; and collective identities and differentiations. Case studies from cultures worldwide.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Recommended background in cultural anthropology (ANP 201 or equivalent)
  • Course description: Description and analysis of agencies and processes involved in administration of justice in the United States.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • SES students only
  • Course description: Economic institutions, reasoning and analysis. Consumption, production, determination of price and quantity in different markets. Income distribution, market structure and normative analysis.
  • Modality: Online, lectures delivered asynchronously with weekly online synchronous recitation on Thursdays from 10:20-11:10am
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
    • SES students only
  • Course description: Systematic study of spatial patterns and processes that have shaped human use and alteration of the world.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Fundamentals of meteorology. Energy balance, adiabatic processes, horizontal motion, cyclogenesis, and severe weather.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Physical, cognitive, social, emotional, and ecological aspects of human growth and development from conception through early childhood.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Human development in the family and across the lifespan with an ecological perspective. Relationships between human resource professionals and family systems.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Strategies, techniques, and resources for the management of personal finance.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
  • Course description: Family and psychosocial factors affecting the development of a person’s sexuality across the life cycle. Reciprocal impact on society and the legal system.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Open to juniors and seniors
  • Course description: The making of the modern world with focus on international relations. Major changes in culture and human understanding of the world.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Military history of the United States in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. American involvement in major conflicts: World War I, World War II, the Korean War, the Cold War, the Vietnam War and the Iraqi wars.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Origins of sports in higher education. Effects of industrialization and television. Civil rights movement in sports: incorporation of women and members of minorities. Title IX era. History of individual sports.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: The exploration and science of aeronautics and space from the age of Galileo to the present. International relations as a driving force in technological advances. Cultural understandings and imaginings of space and space travel.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • None
  • Course description: Interdisciplinary exploration of social problems, relationships, institutions. Exploring diverse perspectives and cultural practices associated with diverse characteristics.
  • Section theme: Topic: Symbolic, economic, ecological, and social aspects of human-animal interaction in a variety of cross-cultural contexts.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
    • SES students only
    • Fulfills first of two courses required from Social Science as part of students’ University requirements
    • Not recommended for Honors students and JMC, TE, or LB majors.
  • Course description: Interdisciplinary exploration of social problems, relationships, institutions. Exploring diverse perspectives and cultural practices associated with diverse characteristics.
  • Section theme: Video games and society
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous with synchronous options
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
    • SES students only
    • Fulfills first of two courses required from Social Science as part of students’ University requirements
    • Not recommended for Honors students and JMC, TE, or LB majors
  • Course description: Interdisciplinary exploration of social hierarchies. Exploring diverse perspectives and cultural practices associated with diverse characteristics.
  • Section theme: Social Differentiation and Inequality: Critical Analysis of Racial[ized] Hierarchy in America.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
    • SES students only
    • Fulfills first of two courses required from Social Science as part of students’ University requirements
    • Not recommended for Honors students and JMC, TE, or LB majors
  • Course description: Statistical and methodological principles from the perspective of a critical consumer of social science research results. Recognizing non-empirical assertions, necessary bases for inferring relationships and causal relationships, common threats to research validity, and pertinent biases in human judgment.
  • Section theme: Topic: The Social Science of Decision Making
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • Not open to first-year students
    • Fulfills second of two courses required from Social Science as part of students’ University requirements
    • Not recommended for Honors students and JMC, TE, or LB majors.
  • Course description: The policymaking process in national government, with emphasis on political participation, the presidency, Congress, Supreme Court, bureaucracy, and civil rights and civil liberties.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous with synchronous options
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
    • SES students only
  • Course description: The science of politics. Theory construction, model building, empirical testing, and inductive inference. Examples from American, international and comparative politics.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous with synchronous options
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • SES students only
  • Course description: Approaches to data analysis in the social sciences. Computational tools for data collection and visualization across various digital sources, including text or social media.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous with synchronous options
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • SES students only
  • Course description: Mind and behavior from biological, individual, and social perspectives. Scientific and professional aspects of psychology.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous with synchronous options
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course
    • SES students only
  • Course description: Nature of sociological inquiry. Concepts and principles of sociology. Institutional features of modern society. Structure and dynamics of social organizations.
  • Modality: Online, asynchronous
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • High demand course

UNDERGRADUATE STUDIES

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  • Course description: Introduction to inquiry, research, and scholarship of complex issues. Special topics designed to engage new students’ interests and advance their ability to consider complex topics, dialogue with diverse others, and use evidence to support opinions.
  • Section theme: A myriad of different histories and peoples have historically coalesced here in Michigan. In this course, students will learn about Michigan’s immigration and migration history  through engagement with global phenomenon such as colonialism, imperialism, capitalism, and neoliberalism, which have all effected the movement of people from around the globe to the state of Michigan. In understanding what forces displaced people, what forces have brought people to the area over the past 200 years, and how people have made Michigan their home, we will see what Michiganders from all backgrounds have in common while also grappling with the power dynamics that lead to the erasure of some groups in the state’s history. We will also research both contemporary and historical community organizations that helped migrants make Michigan home.
  • Modality: Hybrid
    • July 5-8 – virtual synchronous course sessions + weekly programming
    • July 9-14 – no course sessions
    • July 14-17 – in-person course sessions
    • July 18-August 18 – virtual synchronous course sessions + weekly programming
  • Restrictions/Notes:
    • SES students only
    • Course is open to Academic Scholars Program students participating in the Summer ACE Program. To apply please see Honors College website.
    • Course will fulfill an honors college requirement and can count toward either a Social Science or Arts and Humanities University requirement