Our Mission

The Curricular Review Council conducts independent research on university curricula and, in partnership with colleges and universities, provides confidential analysis of the depth and breadth of their course offerings.

Liberal democracy depends on a broadly educated citizenry. Universities, in particular, must expose each generation to the ideas that shape our nation and world — as well as nurture the ability to assess them critically. Yet most institutions lack a textured sense of what is actually taught in their classrooms, even as the evidence suggests that course offerings across the nation are converging on a narrow range of texts and approaches. There is thus an urgent need for independent analysis of course content in our colleges and universities.

The Curricular Review Council conducts independent research on university curricula using data from syllabi and course catalogs. We are especially focused on the balance and breadth of offerings in the social sciences and humanities, as our first report shows. Our aim is descriptive: to establish what is being taught, what is not, and how the mix of authors and ideas in a curriculum has been changing over time.