March 10, 2026

This message is distributed to L&S Senate Faculty and Unit 18 Faculty. (Click here to view description of distribution groups.)

The following is being sent on behalf of Mike Miller, Associate Vice Chancellor and Dean of Undergraduate Education

Dear Faculty,

I am writing to call for applications to teach INT W 1: Introduction to a Letters & Science Education in the coming year. The course was developed and first offered in Fall 2023 for all newly admitted College of Letters & Science first-year students. This is a fully online, asynchronous, one-unit P/NP course. Newly-admitted Letters & Science students will have until mid-October of Fall Quarter 2026 to complete the course, but they will be encouraged to begin work and potentially complete the course following the conclusion of their Orientation session in the summer.

The catalog description:

This course is designed for incoming first-year students in the College of Letters and Science. The goal of the course is to present students with an introduction to liberal arts education at UCSB and provide resources that support academic success. Course materials include readings along with videos of UCSB faculty, advisors, and students. In the three modules of this course, students complete quizzes and contribute to discussion forums developed to help assess learning and facilitate successful academic outcomes.

Instructor Eligibility
For this call, we are seeking instructors within the following appointment categories:

  • All Senate Faculty (including Teaching Professor series)
  • Unit 18 Lecturers

Instructor Duties
Duties expected of primary course instructors will include:

  • Manage course and student engagement on the Canvas platform for two individual offerings of INT W 1 per instructor;
  • Meet online during Summer and Fall with the teaching cohort of other instructors and meet with peer mentors to coordinate course delivery and share feedback;
  • Respond to students’ questions via email and office hours in Summer and Fall;
  • Proactively engage with students in the discussion forum by posting roughly 100-150 brief responses per INT W 1 offering you are supporting;
  • Assign final grades (P/NP only);
  • If possible, attend the two Orientation sessions of the students enrolled in your sections, and briefly (~5 minutes) introduce yourself and the course as part of a general Letters & Science presentation.

Instructors will not be required to develop any individualized material or assignments for this course. All readings, videos, assignments, and other course materials will be provided by Undergraduate Education. See “Course Content” under Additional Information below for more information.

Compensation
Instructors will be compensated via professional development/research funds of $5000 ($2500 per INT W 1 offering, with two offerings per instructor). These funds will be administered through each instructor’s home Department.

Application and Appointment Process
Instructors interested in applying should fill out the following form by the deadline of Thursday, April 9, 2026, 11:59 PM PDT:
https://forms.gle/hdkYXDjFDT9tKtCo7

All final appointments to participate as an instructor of INT W 1 will be accompanied by formal notification outlining agreed-upon duties and detailing the specific compensation plan for each instructor.

Additional Information

Student Enrollment

The complete incoming cohort of first-year freshman admit students in Letters & Science (roughly 4500 students) will be automatically enrolled in this one-unit Fall Quarter course following their Orientation session. To create manageable sections for each instructor, we will offer fourteen (14) sections of 300-400 students each. Each instructor will manage two of these sections.

Although the course will only be listed on the Fall schedule, students will be encouraged at Orientation and through messaging to engage with the course’s modules in advance of the start of Fall. Work in the course can be completed at any point up to the deadline at the end of the third week of Fall, in mid-October. The course is 1.0 unit and graded Passed/Not Passed only.

Course Content

Complete course content has been developed for the course by Undergraduate Education in consultation with the Office of Teaching & Learning. As such, instructors will not be required to develop any individualized material or assignments, though they will be invited to offer feedback and suggest revisions for the course readings, videos, quizzes, and other content. All content will be available to students through the Canvas online platform in a fully asynchronous fashion.

After a Welcome module, course content is grouped into three modules:

  • Module 1: Liberal Arts Education at a Research University
  • Module 2: Advising
    • Orientation Recap
    • Explore UCSB
    • Preparing for Winter Quarter
  • Module 3: UCSB Divisions, Disciplines, and Majors
    • Humanities & Fine Arts
    • Social Sciences
    • MLPS

The Canvas platform for the course includes a discussion forum for students to ask questions about the course as well as more general logistical, resource, and transitional questions. Instructors and peer mentors will be expected to respond to these questions via email and/or virtual or in-person office hours.

Undergraduate Peer Support

Given the number of students involved, we expect some traffic may be generated in the discussion forum around questions related to course content and questions of a more general nature. We will have experienced undergraduate peer assistants who will help monitor the forums and assist instructors in flagging questions as course related or non-course related, and referring to campus resources as appropriate, such as Academic Advising.

INT W 1 Instructor Meetings

Instructors will meet once a month (July, August, September, and October) to review course content and student engagement, and to discuss any issues or questions that arise. Additional meetings may be called if needed. Meetings will be held via Zoom.

Course Schedule

The course is offered fully online with no required synchronous or in-person meeting times. The course will be listed on the Fall 2026 schedule of classes as “ON ASYNC."

Questions?

Please direct any questions regarding this call to Madeleine Sorapure, Associate Dean in Undergraduate Education, College of Letters & Science, at sorapure@ucsb.edu.

Thank you for reading, and we look forward to working with you in delivering this foundational course to incoming College of Letters & Science students.

Sincerely,

Michael Miller
AVC for Undergraduate Education
Dean of Undergraduate Education, Letters and Sciences
University of California, Santa Barbara