General Degree Requirements

This requirement is met by completing Writing 101.

This requirement is met by completing Math 111L, 112L or 122L, 218D-2, 219, and 353.  An alternative set of math courses for engineering students pursuing a Math minor or a Math second major is: Math 111L, 112L, 221, 222, and 356 (or 353).

Replacement of a Skipped Math Course

In some cases, a student may be approved to skip a required math course. This may arise, for example, if a student had the equivalent of Math 219 in high school, but was not able to transfer the credit to Duke as college credit, and the student has been assessed and approved for higher math placement by the Math department and their academic dean. In such cases, a student will be required to take an additional upper-level math or natural science course to replace the skipped math course. Consult each departmental handbook or website for a list of acceptable replacement courses, as they may differ by major. The specific course taken in lieu of the skipped math course must be approved by the DUS.

This requirement is met by completing Chemistry 101DL, Physics 151L and 152L.

Guidance on the Physics Requirement for Those with AP Credit

To satisfy the physics requirement, students must have credit for PHYSICS 151L and 152L, and at least one physics course must be taken post-matriculation.

If you have AP credit for PHYSICS 25 and 26, choose one of the following options as your physics course post-matriculation:

• If you are interested in a second major or a minor in physics, it is suggested that you follow the recommendations for potential physics majors and minors
• If you are not planning a second major or a minor in physics, and you have credit for multivariable calculus, it is suggested that you take PHYSICS 264L Optics & Modern Physics
• If you do not have credit for multivariable calculus and are not planning a second major or minor in physics, we recommend that you take one of the following:
  • PHYSICS 152L, or
  • An Intermediate Core Physics course, selected from: PHYSICS 361, 362D, 363, 464, or 513; or
  • A Gateway Core Physics course, selected from PHYSICS 305, 320L, 380, or 414

Important Considerations for Physics AP Credit

• You do not have the option of taking PHYSICS 151L and then using AP for PHYSICS 26–unless the only AP Physics credit you have is for PHYSICS 26.
• If a student enrolls in a course that uses AP Physics as a prerequisite, the student therefore is unable to take the AP equivalent course as his/her one physics post-matriculation. For example, if a student enrolls in a course that uses PHYSICS 26 AP as a prerequisite, the student can no longer take PHYSICS 152L as their one physics post-matriculation after that particular semester.

Varies by department. Each department maintains a list of allowed courses that will satisfy the Mathematics or Natural Science elective requirement. Consult those department websites and/or departmental offices.

Students in the Pratt School of Engineering who matriculated before Fall 2025 are required to have a minimum of 5 full-credit (1.0) courses in the social sciences and humanities (SS/H), including foreign languages.  More specifically:

1. At most, 2 of these 5 course credits can be met by any combination of 2 from the following options*:
   • Advanced Placement (AP) Credit
   • International Placement Credit (IPC)
   • Duke-offered courses that are only offered on a Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory grading basis.
2. All 5 courses must have at least one code of SS, ALP, CZ, or FL.
3. At least one course must have an SS Area of Knowledge code.
4. Two courses must be in two of the other Areas of Knowledge of ALP, CZ, or FL.
5. Courses must be taken for a grade, and not on a selective S/U graded option.
6. A student must show depth in one subject area by taking two courses with the same department subject code–and one course must be at the 200-level, or above. For departments grouped together such as AMES, Art, Art History, and Visual Media Studies, or Classical Studies (just to name a few), the depth requirement is satisfied by taking two courses in the same department, i.e., two Chinese courses or two Korean courses, but not by taking a Chinese course and a Korean course.

Non-social science and non-humanities departments (including engineering courses and other departments) assign SS, CZ, or ALP codes for some of their courses.  Effective Fall 2013, the Pratt School of Engineering requires that SS/H courses must be taken from or cross-listed* with one of the following departments or programs:

• African & African American Studies
• Art, Art History, and Visual Media Studies (includes ARTHIST, HCVIS, ARTVIS, VMS)
• Arts of the Moving Image
• Asian American & Diaspora Studies Program
• Asian and Middle Eastern Studies (Arabic, Chinese, Hebrew, Hindi, Japanese, Korean, Persian, Sanskrit, Tibetan, Turkish, Urdu)
• Canadian Studies
• Cinema
• Classical Studies (Greek, Latin)
• Cultural Anthropology
• Dance (only 1.0 credit courses, with a code)
• Documentary Studies
• East Asian Studies
• Economics
• Education
• English
• Ethics
• Financial Economics – FECON
• Financial Markets – FMKT
• Gender, Sexuality & Feminist Studies
• Germanic Languages and Literature
• Global Cultural Studies in Literature
• History
• Innovation and Entrepreneurship
• International Comparative Studies
• Islamic Studies
• Jewish Studies
• Latin American Studies
• LSGS
• Linguistics
• Markets and Management Studies
• Medieval and Renaissance Studies
• Music
• Philosophy
• Political Science
• Psychology
• Public Policy Studies
• Religious Studies
• Romance Studies (ASL, Creole, French, Italian, K’iche’ Maya, Portuguese, Quechua, Spanish)
• Science and Society
• Slavic and Eurasian Studies (Balto-Finnic, Polish, Romanian, Russian, Serbian & Croation, Ukrainian, Uzbek)
• Sociology
• Swahili
• Theater Studies
• Visual & Media Studies
• Women’s Studies

*EGR 305 and ECON 212 are EXCLUDED from satisfying the SS/H requirement even though the course is cross-listed.  In addition, Writing courses that carry course codes do not satisfy the SS/H requirement.

AP credits do not carry course codes. However, in the Pratt School of Engineering we attribute the following Areas of Knowledge to these AP exams**:

• History (CZ)
• Psychology (SS)
• Political Science (SS)
• Language Courses (FL)
• English (ALP)
• Economics (SS)

**AP exams which have the Duke equivalent as a 200-level course will NOT count as the Pratt School of Engineering depth requirement. 

Consult an academic dean for any question on how AP credits count toward the SS/H requirement.

This requirement is met by completion of one course from each of four of the following seven areas:

• Digital systems
• Electrical science
• Information and computer science
• Mechanics (solid and fluid)
• Materials science
• Systems analysis
• Thermal science and transfer processes

Students are expected to have acquired digital-computer programming capability before their sophomore year. The programming capability is satisfied by Engineering 103L or CompSci 201.

This requirement is met by completing Engineering 101L.

The department administering the major field of study will specify this requirement. In general, it will consist of both required courses and electives to be planned in consultation with the departmental adviser. Including the 4 credits in engineering and applied sciences listed under general requirements, a total of 13.0 credits in engineering work are required.