<p>Hey, I am a senior in high school and I'll be going to Carleton next year. Got in ED in December!</p>
<p>I am wondering about the language programs at Carleton. I want to take either Arabic or Chinese, and I'm leaning towards Arabic right now. It all depends on the programs, though -- if the Arabic professors aren't as good or if the Chinese department is better for some other reason, I would be willing to switch. Can anyone give me some info on this? </p>
<p>Also, while I want to keep my options open and this is very subject to change, if I had to choose right now I would be a history major. I am also interested in psychology, though, and I really like what I've read about the cognitive science concentration. Is this a good program? I have a brother who recently graduated from Kenyon as an IR major who is also interested in psych but said that Kenyon's psych department takes a rather "mathy" approach to the subject so he didn't take many classes there. I am also much more interested in a theoretical approach, with studies of psychological thinkers and more writing-based classes, etc. So, if anyone has any feedback on the Carleton psych dept. in these terms, that would be fantastic. Thanks!</p>
<p>ps. info on the history dept. would also be appreciated!</p>
<p>Hi goods316! I am currently in my second term of Arabic (the sequence goes for 5 terms) so I can tell you about that - I have no experience with the Chinese department though, sorry. Arabic is a relatively new/small language here at Carleton - we only have 2 professors, no LA (language assistant: kind of like a TA for language classes), etc. - but it is growing/improving a ton each year and I know the College is pouring a lot of funding into it. </p>
<p>My experience with Arabic has been really good so far, and I love it (although I’m a total language nerd, so maybe I’m a little biased ) It can be a lot of work, especially because we meet 5 days a week as opposed to MWF or TTh like other classes, but that’s the case with any intro language class. We also have lots of extracurricular events as part of our class, like Arabic movie nights and language table (where we attempt to speak Arabic to each other at lunch), which I think are lots of fun. I’d say if you are excited about Arabic and willing to put in the effort to learn it, go for it! That being said, my impression of the Chinese department is that they are very good too, so hopefully someone can tell you about them too so you can know about both languages.</p>
<p>For your other questions, I haven’t had a chance to really get involved in any of the departments you asked about - but be aware that you have a whole 6 terms and 18 classes to explore these things before you even declare a major! My advice is to just go ahead and take classes in these things to see for yourself You can also email professors or students majoring in the things you’re interested in; I’m sure any of them would be happy to tell you about their department. </p>
<p>Hope this helps. Can’t wait to see you on campus next year!</p>
<p>That sounds really cool! Thanks a lot. I mainly wanted to make sure Arabic wasn’t “bad” – or as bad as it gets at Carleton – compared to other language departments. It sounds like a great program, though. Another question: do a lot of Arabic students study abroad in the middle east/africa in their junior year? I definitely want to, but I’m wondering about the sequencing – if it’s five classes, then it would end winter of sophomore year, so if you went abroad at the middle or end of junior year, wouldn’t you be a little stale on Arabic knowledge?</p>
<p>You can go abroad anytime you want/can fit it in, actually! Although I don’t think anybody does freshman year, and very few seniors do. So most people in Arabic, if they do choose to study abroad, do it the summer after sophomore year when they’ve finished the sequence - that’s what I’m planning to do I do know of two people who went summer after freshman year, a junior who went fall term this year, and I’ve heard of others going at various other times, so you’re by no means limited to anything. Where are you thinking you might want to go?</p>
<p>Also, you don’t have to stop after 5 terms - there are upper-level Arabic courses that you can take after you finish the ‘required’ sequence, and you can always do an independent study (which several current seniors did, since they went through it when the department was still very small and not very good). So you definitely don’t have to forget your Arabic if you don’t want to!</p>
<p>Ohh that’s a good point, I wasn’t really thinking about the summer. There are a bunch of places that would be great – I would love to go to Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, or Turkey, but anything in that general area would be awesome. Where are you going? I’m glad there are a lot of options for after the requirement, that may prove useful</p>
<p>Hey goods316, I’m a current senior at Carleton. Congrats on your acceptance! I hope you’ll love it here as much as I do.</p>
<p>Anyway, I’m a psych major so I thought I’d share my thoughts on the department. In high school my state of mind was kind of like yours, I didn’t really like the idea of a psych department that was “mathy” and I wanted to stick to things where paper-writing would be most of the work. So what is Carleton’s department like? Well, it’s hard to say for sure. I would say that the department is pretty balanced. Most of the classes I guess are kind of “scientific method” focused in that we talk a lot about what research is going on in the world of psychology. You are required to take a statistics class, but otherwise there isn’t a ton of math going on. I would say that while we definitely talk about the theoretical framework of the different areas within psychology (and we write plenty of papers), we don’t really do a ton of the sort of “make an argument using what you intuitively feel to be correct” essays, instead focusing on what research actually shows. I ended up loving it, I went from being a kid who skipped taking science senior year of high school to feeling like I’m essentially a science major. Sorry if this response is kind of rambling, it’s 1:30 am and I’m writing this instead of doing my comps project (like a senior thesis) Hope this helps,</p>
<p>Thanks! That’s really useful info. I like scientific-type thinking, I suppose, just not hard math and stuff. Stat is a little different though, so I would probably be okay with that too. Is the intro to psych class very basic/are the profs good? Also, do a lot of people do the cognitive science concentration? I’m thinking about it, and I like what I see.</p>
) It can be a lot of work, especially because we meet 5 days a week as opposed to MWF or TTh like other classes, but that’s the case with any intro language class. We also have lots of extracurricular events as part of our class, like Arabic movie nights and language table (where we attempt to speak Arabic to each other at lunch), which I think are lots of fun. I’d say if you are excited about Arabic and willing to put in the effort to learn it, go for it! That being said, my impression of the Chinese department is that they are very good too, so hopefully someone can tell you about them too so you can know about both languages.</p>