Global Challenges: Understanding is the first signature Global Challenges course first-year students take at LUC. It aims to help you think and talk about global challenges as fundamentally complex, multi-level, multi-layered, interdisciplinary and dynamic problems that do not have -neat ‘solutions’. Instead, these challenges can only be engaged with continuously, in a conversation or debate between people with different experiences of the problem, different values, and different kinds of positions and forms of expertise. Becoming a Global Citizen requires you to find your own way of understanding, and later engaging, with these challenges.

In block 1, all first years will attend lectures focused on Dutch history and culture. This part of the course requires no specific foundation in history, though students who took Dutch history at their secondary school should note that this course will offer the subject at a more advanced, academic level and that there will be very little overlap with the VWO history curriculum.

In block 2, students who are fluent in Dutch (near-native or native level) will continue the course with a focus on Dutch-language science communication. Students who do not have Dutch fluency will continue the course with a focus on language acquisition. Students whose Dutch language skills fall between the requirements for the two tracks will take a test in Block 1 to determine which option is most suitable for them.

Academic Writing is a group of courses that will teach you, step by step, how to write excellent essays and conduct relevant research at university. These courses offer an introduction to various academic disciplines, including history, literary studies, cultural studies, international relations, and (international) law. The following Academic Writing courses are offered:

- Dilemmas of Justice in the Aftermath of Mass Atrocities
- The Politics of Human Rights in International Organisations
- The Ancient World Today
- The Concept of Genocide
- Political Thinking
- Inside the Medieval Mind: Fear, Magic, and Everyday Life
- Negotiating Space: Cities, Infrastructure, and Belonging
- Conflict Resolution
- The History of Uncertainty

Statistics is a powerful tool for both academic research and everyday reasoning. From evaluating scientific claims to identifying patterns in social behavior, statistical thinking helps us make sense of evidence-based findings. In this course, you’ll learn how to analyze, interpret, and visualize data, the skills essential for conducting research and becoming a critical consumer of information. Whether you're preparing for your own research or simply curious about the numbers behind the news, this course will help you build a foundation. No prior experience is required, though students less confident with math are encouraged to review the support materials provided.

In block 2 you get to select your elective course to explore different fields and to help you decide which major you wish to take in your second and third year. You can selects from any of the 100 level courses listed in the e-prospectus here (click on "year 1" and then "electives").

Building upon the knowledge and skills developed in the course Global Challenges: Understanding, this course invites students to investigate the ways that global challenges play out in local contexts, with an emphasis on The Hague. In teams, students will choose amongst a selection of local challenges and be tasked with exploring the multi-dimensional nature of these complex problems and the ways that different groups—civil servants, university researchers, community leaders, artists, and others—engage with these issues.

You will develop your knowledge of local contexts and deepen your understanding of theories of (global) citizenship, ultimately considering what it means to act in solidarity with others. Then you will apply your knowledge and skills of your challenges to design game-based learning projects to be developed for local secondary-school students.

In block 3 you get to select two more elective courses to explore different fields and to help you decide which major you wish to take in your second and third year. You can select from any of the 100 level courses listed in the e-prospectus here (click on "year 1" and then "electives").

The history of philosophy is really the history of the various arts and sciences. Long before we started distinguishing the various disciplines from each other (or trying to bring them back together, as we do at LUC), philosophy was the area of inquiry that addressed all of their questions. This course will focus on ethical issues—not only those having to do with why we think some behaviors are right and others wrong, but also with how we go about building a character and living a good life. Alongside its ethical emphasis, this course will serve as an introduction to several core philosophical issues, with the aim of making students better critical thinkers as they go on to consider the many ethical problems surrounding contemporary global challenges in their other courses.

The mathematics courses in the first year are designed to be accessible for all students from all mathematics levels. The focus is on understanding how mathematics is embedded in everyday activities and how it relates to real world challenges. Even without a strong mathematical background, you will be able to learn to work with data and to understand the language of mathematics in an accessible way. LUC offers the following four mathematics courses: 

- Mathematics for Cryptography
Have you ever wondered how your passwords stay secure or how secret messages are sent over the internet? This course explores the relationship between elementary number theory and cryptography, requiring no background knowledge in either topic. We will start by covering the necessary mathematics that cryptography builds on, emphasising computation and problem-solving. Every new topic will be accompanied by a programming assignment, and gradually we will introduce more concepts from cryptography. A major project will also be carried out that will allow students to implement a cryptosystem to encrypt messages in R. Topics include prime numbers, modular arithmetic, greatest common divisors, and public-key encryption methods like Rivest-Shamir-Adleman (RSA). Along the way, students will also develop basic programming skills in Python to experiment with encryption, decryption, and number-theoretic computations.

- Mathematics for the Life Sciences
The objective of this course is to develop mathematical reasoning and calculus skills to analyze changes and equilibria in biological and environmental processes. This course enhances student’s analytical thinking and problem-solving skills through illustrative examples in lectures; project work and coding in R. Examples and data are drawn from animal and plant biology; ecology; environmental and biomedical sciences; epidemiology and human health. They cover different organizational levels; ranging from temporal changes in individual cells (e.g.; tumor cells) to movements of organisms throughout their environment. The course reviews mathematical foundations including exponential and logarithmic functions and derivatives; and serves as an introduction to differential calculus.

- Mathematics for Music
Music is built out of a collection of concepts (harmony, melody, scales, rhythm, tuning, timbre, form, and more) that work together in precise ways to effectively communicate a feeling or an idea. Mathematics provides us with a set of conceptual frameworks that can be used to better understand the structure underlying these concepts and the interplay between them.  The objective of this course is to develop mathematical ideas that can be used both to analyze the structure of existing musical pieces and to aid in the expression of new musical ideas. The course introduces a selection of mathematical concepts – including but not limited to logarithms, trigonometric functions, least common multiples, modular arithmetic, rational and irrational numbers, and group theory – and applies them to various topics in music theory. Labs throughout the term will provide opportunities to explore the structural features of music using digital tools. As a final project students will create a musical composition that applies the principles they’ve learned, and present a mathematical analysis of their new piece.

- Mathematics for Social Networks
Social networks are dynamic, intricate and often surprising in many aspects. Individuals form friendships, exchange messages, organize into communities, and influence each other’s decisions. All of these and many other features can be represented and studied using mathematical tools. These networks have similarities with biological networks such as the brain, financial networks among banks, transportation networks and various other complex systems we experience everyday around our lives. All of these have some common mathematical features. This course introduces students to the foundational mathematical techniques used to study social networks, from graph theory to probabilistic models. The course emphasizes real world applications, including information spread on social media, the formation of clusters, and the robustness of social systems.