Common Reading

2026 Summer Common Reading Assignment

First Year Preceptorial is a required course for all new first‑year Knox students. Preceptorial is about engaging new ideas and complicated material and thinking about how to make sense of them. It also asks students to do this engaging and thinking through writing. To help you begin to process the book, we are asking you to engage in the first part of a well-organized writing process: notetaking and annotating. We will do more of this in class—this is your first chance to engage with what you have read and begin to process what you think about it.

For this first assignment, you have two tasks. First, read the First Year Common Reading, Learning to Disagree: The Surprising Path to Navigating Differences with Empathy and Respect by John Inazu. This book is timely to our current political and social climate and will challenge you to interrogate your own beliefs, articulate your values, and see the world from other perspectives. The book is structured around the academic year, which will help you anticipate the many things you will encounter at Knox in your first year.

Your second task is to take thorough notes on a chapter of your choice. Each chapter deals with a specific theme, and your job is to highlight how these themes have appeared in your own life. 

To complete this assignment, you should:

1. Choose a chapter to annotate and take notes on how this chapter might relate to an experience or experiences in your own life.
2. In your notes, underline passages in the text and summarize important points.
3. In your notes, be sure to write out questions you have about the reading or places you might disagree with the author or a character. 
4. Keep your notes! You will need them at New Student Orientation.

Please note that the use of generative AI to complete any portion of this assignment is explicitly prohibited. This assignment is meant to help you in your own thinking process and how you respond to the ideas in the Common Reading. There is not a “right” way to do this–it is simply about getting your own thoughts and reactions on the page!

Be sure to keep a copy of your reflection, because you will be using your reactions to the Common Reading in a session at New Student Orientation.