Choosing Courses
We hope the following resources will help you develop a personally coherent, meaningful education from Stanford's diverse course offerings.
Frosh-Friendly Courses
Frosh-Friendly Courses allow students to explore a field of study early in their Stanford careers, generally with minimal or no prerequisites.
One Unit Wonders and Terrific Twos
There are many courses at Stanford that are only 1 or 2 units, including “introduction to the field” courses, speaker-series courses, and activity courses.
Courses for your General Education Requirements (GERs)
Learn how to select courses for your COLLEGE, writing, foreign language, and Ways requirements.
Courses for your Major
Learn how to choose courses that will fulfill the requirements for your intended major.
Your Questions Answered
For more advice on choosing your courses, check out the Advising Student Handbook, and particularly the following pages:
- How many classes should I take?
- How do I research a course?
- Understanding the course catalog
- What does it mean when a course has variable units (3-5, etc)?
- Should I "shop" more classes than I expect to enroll in?
- What are my graduation requirements?
Additional Resources for Choosing Courses
Exploring Your Stanford Courses
Unsure how to navigate among all your course choices? This video presentation by your Academic Advisors will help you get started!
Incredible Introsems
Introductory Seminars (IntroSems) offer small-group courses taught by esteemed faculty to frosh and sophomores. Class sizes are small, with priority given to those who apply in advance.
Stanford Syllabus Project
Want to learn more about a particular course? This archive allows you to read past and present course syllabuses posted by faculty.
Take Classes with Award-Winning Teachers
Explore courses taught by award-winning faculty from departments across campus. Stanford honors faculty, staff, and students for outstanding service and commitment to the University’s mission through a variety of University Awards.
Gateway Courses in the Humanities
Interested in studying the humanities and arts, but don't know where to begin? Browse our list of Gateway Courses in the Humanities. You can also find humanities courses by typing the special tag HUMSCI::humanities directly in the search bar of ExploreCourses.
The Humanities Core
Explore traditions, texts, ideas, intellectual and literary history around the world.
STEM Roadmap
This interactive tool from the School of Engineering shows some common pathways to starting different majors in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM).
Oral Communication Courses
Check out courses that will teach you the fundamental principles of public speaking.