Welcome to Intensive First-Year Seminars

IFS is a transition-to-college program. It is your chance to step into life at IU Bloomington before the fall semester even begins. With IFS, you will move into your dorm on campus early to work with leading faculty in a 3-credit course, create your first college friendships, immerse yourself in unique programming designed to connect you with IU's extensive resources, and prepare yourself for life at college.

IFS 2024 takes place from August 4th to August 21st, right before the fall semester begins. Virtual week starts on August 4th. IFS students move to campus on August 11th, and in-person class meetings begin on August 12th.

Your success at IU begins here

At IFS, you'll have the opportunity to:

  • Connect with a top professor
  • Participate in a small and rigorous college class
  • Learn alongside other incoming freshman & create lasting friendships
  • Explore IU's campus
  • Discover opportunities for leadership, service, and study

Connect with faculty

Learn from one of Indiana University's leading faculty members in a small classroom setting. Because IFS classes are small, students have the chance to work individually with their professor and make personal relationships with faculty. With classes in a variety of subjects and unique co-curricular opportunities, there's an IFS class for every type of student.

Create friendships

When you attend IFS, you aren't just academically successful, you're socially involved too. You will participate in a variety of activities and events while exploring campus and making friends with new and returning IU students. Meet other students before coming to campus at IFS virtual events. Have a blast at the IFS Welcome Festival, perform a hidden talent at an Open Mic Night, attend an outdoor movie night, and more. Experiences aren't limited to what happens in the classroom. At IFS, you'll never be bored.

Puzzles and Problems

Jacob Emery

This course explores the kinds of thinking involved in different varieties of puzzles and how puzzling thinking relates to other kinds of intellectual inquiry. We will engage with traditional objects of scholarly research and works of art as puzzles to be solved. 

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Devised Theatre as Community-Based Storying and Activism

Gustave Weltsek

This course disrupts the idea that theatre is a passive spectator event, and allows students' diverse stories to come together through active, creative collaboration. 

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Popular Music as a History Book: Latin America in the 20th Century

Sergio Ospina Romero

This course offers a historical and musical journey through Latin America in the 20th century. We will examine the multiple roles of music, media, and the arts in society, and their transcendence far beyond the arena of entertainment.

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Explore our courses

Check out the exciting topics you can study in IFS.

Courses

Reserve your spot

Complete the IFS application to register for IFS 2024.

Apply now