We are the College of Liberal Arts, but the University of Minnesota also has Liberal Education requirements for all students. What we call liberal education other institutions call general education or distribution requirements, but whatever you call these requirements, almost all institutions have them. These requirements effectively spell out the kinds of things that an institution believes an educated person should know or understand. Here at the U, these are split into core (disciplinary groupings such as mathematical thinking, literature, history, etc.) and themes (subject matter groupings such as the environment or technology and society).