What Is Discovery?

All students at UNH, including Honors Program members, must fulfill the requirements of the Discovery Program. These courses are intended to make sure every UNH graduate has a well-rounded education with some experience of each major area of academic study and fundamental skills in writing, math, and critical thinking.

What's Different for Honors Students?

Honors Program members have the opportunity to take unique versions of Discovery courses. These courses are small and almost always discussion-based. Fulfilling Discovery Program requirements with Honors courses means that there are not additional course requirements to complete this part of the Honors Program; students complete Honors and Discovery requirements at the same time.

The Discovery Categories
You'll need to take one course for each category. Courses.unh.edu will tell you whether a course fulfills a Discovery category, and you should check with your advisor to see if any AP tests or early college courses will fulfill your Discovery requirements. We have provided some notes below about common ways of fulfilling these requirements, but these will apply only to some majors. At Orientation and in 1:1 meetings with advisors during the summer, your advisors will explain any particularities about Discovery for your major.

Writing Skills (WS): Fulfilled by ENGL 401, First-Year Writing

Quantitative Reasoning (QR): Often fulfilled by calculus or statistics courses required by certain majors

Inquiry (INQ): All 444 Honors Seminars fulfill this requirement.

Biological Sciences (BS): Often fulfilled by Intro to Biology courses required for Life Sciences majors

Environment, Technology, and Society (ETS): Certain engineering majors fulfill this through their curriculum and do not take a separate Discovery course

Fine and Performing Arts (FPA)

Historical Perspectives (HP)

Humanities (HUMA): Paul College students will fulfill this requirement through a business ethics course.

Physical Sciences (PS): Most CEPS students will fulfill this through physics courses.

Social Sciences (SS): Many students will fulfill this through psychology or economics courses required by majors.

World Cultures (WC): This requirement can be fulfilled by study abroad or certain language courses.