First Step Discovery In Action

Transforming Beginning Requirements into Discovery Journeys for Everyone

Background image: Cal Berkeley, Student Discovery Project
Image credit:
Karina Palua's CompLit 60 AC, Joshua Chang, Guadalupe Cordova, Samantha Herrera, Kailyn Jackson, Karen Lam, Aren Martinian

First Step Discovery reimagines introductory courses as stand-alone seminars, redesigning traditional skills-based classes into intensive inquiry-based, collaborative learning experiences

Our Mission

Focus the learning process on the student

Deliver the tools and skills needed for their academic journeys

Connect beginning students from all walks of life with university resources and opportunities 

Cultivate inquiry, curiosity and creative thinking

Build empathy and imagination

Encourage collaboration and community

First Step Discovery, Cal Berkeley

Listen to how First Step Discovery transforms students and teachers

Spotlight: Student First Step Projects

What Happens in AI Art Generation?

First Step Discovery, Cal Berkeley

"Using this method of AI Art ‘Telestrations,’ I developed a loop in which AI feeds on itself, which enabled me to observe and critique how AI generated art evolved over 12 generations from my own sample of art submitted to Bing AI.

- Grace Zhou, R4A Class with Continuing Lecturer Ben Spanbock.

TEACHER SPOTLIGHT: Minsook Kim

First Step Discovery, Cal Berkeley

Re-shaping Teaching with Inquiry-based Learning

“My goal was to reshape my Korean courses from a traditional skill- and drill-based approach into an inquiry-based classroom. Students engage in practical applications like problem-solving, questioning and projects to develop their ability to think creatively and critically. Discovery experiences foster a deeper understanding of materials, beyond the course."

- Minsook Kim, Senior Lecturer, East Asian Languages & Cultures (Korean)

For more teacher testimonials, see below or click Profiles.

Awards and Recognition

First Step Discovery, Cal Berkeley

Award-Winning Bears in History Project

First Step students in CWR4B "Images of History" were awarded a Creative Discovery Grant for this research project to raise awareness about the Japanese American Internment of over 500 UC Berkeley students forcibly interned in violation of their constitutional rights.  Read the forgotten stories of three members of our community: Yoshiko Uchida, Mine Okubo and Monroe Deutsch.

First Step Discovery, Cal BerkeleyAward-Winning Research Essay: They'll Figure that I'm a Queer

Winner of the Charlene Conrad Liebau Library Prize for Undergraduate Research, this project by student Ryan Gottschalk (History '25) documents the erasure of queer Japanese-Americans during their WWII incarceration. Evidence of queerness in institutional records was scant but revealing. Gottschalk searched The Bancroft Library’s Japanese American Evacuation and Resettlement Records —  only to find 14 instances of the word “homosexual."

Read about the students who, under the guidance of teachers participating in First Step Discovery, won five of the six lower division Charlene Conrad Liebau Library 2023 Prizes for Undergraduate Research.

First Step Discovery, Cal Berkeley

Teacher Spotlight: Chika Shibahara

"There are many kinds of “discovery-based” approaches that can be effective for different kinds of courses. Instructors can explore the many possibilities without being afraid of making mistakes, because this is a process of discovery for us, too. We can rethink and reconstruct what we have cultivated through the lens of discovery."

- Chika Shibahara, Lecturer, East Asian Languages & Cultures (Japanese)

First Step Discovery, Cal Berkeley

Teacher Spotlight: Chisako Cole

"Discovery allows students to move forward in their thinking and in creating through magnanimity, inclusion and crowd generosity, not competition or intimidation. Discovery has allowed me to find a balance between structure and freedom/spontaneity, but still providing scaffolded steps/guidelines for students along the way." 

- Chisako Cole, Continuing Lecturer, College Writing Programs

First Step Discovery, Cal Berkeley

Teacher Spotlight: Karen Llagas

“Seeing all the thought and care that has gone into the participants' projects has encouraged me to continue expanding my pedagogy, take risks and co-discover and co-create with my students. I very much appreciate having this collegial community to discuss learning approaches. I love the collaboration with librarians in opening up access to the archives and how excited students were to visit them.”

- Karen Llagas, Lecturer, South and Southeast Asian Studies (Filipino)

First Step Discovery, Cal Berkeley

Teacher Spotlight: Carmen Acevedo Butcher

"The Discovery project and frame are important because they emphasize community and conversation as the core of research, writing and all academic endeavors. My students were eager to be a part of this discovery path that I was and am on and have been my entire career. Making student work central to the texts under study communicates to students that they are in dialogue with each other."

- Carmen Acevedo Butcher, Lecturer, College Writing Programs