As part of the foundation of a Knox College education, summer common reading assignments have become part of the core curriculum, welcoming first-year students to the College with their first official course, First-Year Preceptorial. 

The purpose of FP is simple: prepare incoming Knox students with what a liberal arts education looks like, and give them an idea of what is expected of them in the classroom in terms of participation.

“FP is about fun, it’s free-ranging, the professors can teach whatever they want,” said Scott Harris, faculty liaison to the First-Year Experience. “FP is fundamentally about conversation and knowing what a Knox classroom and education are like. 

“I’ve been at other institutions, where the class sizes are much larger, and the conversation is much more stilted and difficult to facilitate. When you have 80 students in a lecture hall vs. 18 in a classroom, you get to know your professor on a first-name basis, you’re integrated into each other’s lives. That familiarity provides space for people to be more authentic and comfortable.”

This summer’s First-Year Preceptorial common reading is Learning to Disagree by John Inazu. 

Inazu is the Sally D. Danforth Distinguished Professor of Law and Religion at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. He spoke at the Etz Family Institute for Civic Leadership and Dialogue inaugural public event, "Learning to Disagree Across the Culture Wars," in October 2024 at the Orpheum Theatre in downtown Galesburg.

The theme of his book is teaching students the importance of establishing dialogues with those they disagree with, and navigating differences of belief and opinion with understanding and respect.

“The book tackles how we unpack our issues and talk to others who see those particular issues differently,” Harris said. “How do we have a genuine conversation with someone we disagree with and be comfortable in our disagreement? Sometimes you have a compromise, sometimes a consensus and sometimes, at some point, it’s ‘this is a point we disagree on, and that’s ok.’”

Along with the summer reading, incoming students will receive questions on the material to encourage discussion when arriving on campus and participating in their first meeting with their FP group during New Student Orientation. Throughout the fall term, students and their professors will engage in discussions and activities based on the book’s themes.

“This highlights the interdisciplinary transcendence of a Knox education in a classroom environment,” Harris said. “You may have an environmental studies professor teaching a course on board games, or an English literature professor teaching the history of food. There’s such an emphasis on major and minor selection that limits what you can study. This course gives students another set of tools to talk about bigger issues. These topics may seem bizarre to them, but in the broader perspective these issues transcend any discipline.”

FP has become a hallmark of a Knox education. The selected reading and course implementation have changed, but the fundamentals of the course remain the same: prepare and challenge the incoming students with the College’s expectations.

“FP goes back a long way. Every topic and class is different, each instructor chooses the topic to address the themes,” Harris said. “There might be a class on games and culture that features board games, video games, and game theory. There might be an FP on food as social interaction, one on science fiction, or human identity. The students are in different classrooms, have different instructors, and participate in different lessons, but they all have the shared experience of shared reading. There is a common text but also diversity in the course."

In addition to the reading, discussions, and work, Inazu will visit campus in September, hosting a discussion with students and faculty on his book. Accompanying the talk on his book, Inazu will engage in a question-and-answer session with first-year students.

“The FP students will gather, John Inazu will give a brief presentation of his book, and informed rationale for writing, but the majority of the time students will pose questions stemming from the book or how he applied his methodology to it.

“We found last fall that the Q and A session was excellent. Knox students, when given the opportunity, are very insightful and curious.”