Course Offerings for 2025-26

students drawing in classPlease note: Course cost DOES NOT include student registration fee or family technology fee. Course offerings are subject to change based on student enrollment.

All courses listed meet on the campus of Houston Christian University.
Meeting days are Tuesday/Thursday unless otherwise noted.

View the full Academy Book Lists here.

Apply to The Academy at HCU!

PRE-REGISTER FOR 2025-26

English 1313: Composition and Literature I
Recommended for 9th-12th grade students. This course is a pre-requisite for ENGL 1323.

A student-driven, Socratic-style literature class that integrates training in composition and rhetoric. Students will complete a research paper in MLA format.

Reading list includes Homer’s Odyssey, Virgil’s Aeneid, Sophocles’ Antigone, Aristotle’s Poetics, Dante’s The Divine Comedy, Shakespeare’s Hamlet and more.

We recommend that the course be counted as high school English credit. Students will earn three undergraduate credit hours in English 1313 from Houston Christian University.

Tuesday/Thursday | 11:00 am-12:15 pm
$1000 per course, 3 units of transferable college credit.

ENGL 1313 Book List 2025-26

Pre-register for the Academy

ENGL 1323: Composition and Literature II
Recommended for 11th-12th grade students.

Prerequisite: ENGL 1313.  Please note, this course can only be taken after successful completion of ENGL 1313 or upon submission of a college transcript showing successful completion of Freshman Composition I.

This course continues the study of composition and rhetoric introduced in English 1313: Composition and Literature I. Students will gain an understanding of why reading literature is deeply important for Christians; learn the conventions of such literary genres as poems, stories, novels, and plays; study methods of literary analysis; and interpret literature from a Biblical perspective through the exploration of Biblical archetypes, typology, language constructions, and metaphor in classic works of Western literature. Students will learn to write well-constructed arguments about literature and life in standard English, culminating in a fully developed research paper in MLA format.

Reading list includes Shakespeare’s Winter’s Tale, Wordsworth and Coleridge’s Lyrical Ballads, Austen’s Sense and Sensibility, Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment, selected poems and short stories, and more.

We recommend that the class be counted as high school English credit. Students will earn three undergraduate credit hours in English 1323 from Houston Christian University.

HCU Campus
Tuesday/Thursday | 12:30-1:45 pm
$1000 per year, 3 units of transferable college credit.

ENGL 1323 Book List 2025-26

Pre-register for the Academy

History 2311: Western Civilization I
Noah Shuler
Recommended for 9th-12th grade students.

A student-driven, Socratic-style classroom environment, integrating training in university-level essay writing and a comprehensive understanding of the major shifts of Western Culture, with a special emphasis in the literature from the Ancient World to the end of the Middle Ages in Europe.

Reading list includes Homer, Herodotus, Cicero, Augustine, Anselm, Shakespeare, Aquinas, Erasmus, and much more.

We recommend that this course be counted as both high school history and English credit. Students will earn three undergraduate credit hours in History 2311 from Houston Christian University.

Tuesday/Thursday | 2:00-3:15 pm
$1000 per year, 3 units of transferable college credit.

HIST 2311 Reading List 2025-26

Pre-register for the Academy

Philosophy 1313: Introduction to Philosophy
Dr. Shannon Holzer
Recommended for 10th-12th grade students.

A student-driven, Socratic-style classroom environment designed to familiarize the student with the meaning and relevance of philosophy through a study of its main problems and the principal theories that have been proposed as solutions to them. The guiding question for this course is “What is a human being?”

Reading list includes Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, Pascal, Wittgenstein, Lewis, and much more.

We recommend that this course be counted as either high school history, philosophy, or English credit. Students will earn three undergraduate credit hours in Philosophy 1313 from Houston Christian University.

Tuesday/Thursday | 9:30-10:45 pm
$1000 per year, 3 units of transferable college credit.

PHIL 1313 Book List 2025-26

Pre-register for the Academy

CINE 1321: The Art of Cinema Production
Professor Chris Hartwell
Recommended for 9th-12th grade students.

A comprehensive overview of the video production process, including an introduction to camera operation, lighting and sound equipment, general set protocols, post-production software, and workflow. Students will also be introduced to cinematic storytelling with the chance to make short films and other productions throughout the class.

Tuesday/Thursday | 9:30-10:45 am
$1000 per year, 3 units of transferable college credit.

Required Supplies/Materials for CINE 1321

Pre-register for the Academy

High school juniors and seniors are also eligible to enroll in traditional one-semester undergraduate courses alongside college students. Interested students should check the  course catalog, then email TheAcademy@hc.edu for class availability and dean’s approval.

NOTE: these courses may meet on different days/times than the two-semester Academy courses.

$1000 per 3-credit course, transferable college credit.

Pre-register for the Academy