<p>I saw from Olin college website that there are currently only one professor of chemistry and two professors of biology. Does this mean that Olin puts little emphasis on biology/chemistry? </p>
<p>I thought that Olin is a great engineering college, yet these faculty profiles actually keep me from hoping big(?!) about Olin. </p>
<p>At Olin, the practical means of strengthening chemistry/biology is only to
cross-register at other schools?</p>
<p>Since I want to major in chemical engineering, I am concerned about this :(</p>
<p>Keep in mind that there are only about 40 faculty members at Olin.
One of President Miller's "Big Ideas" this year was to have a Bioengineering major, which was rather well received. This includes more faculty. Hopefully it will be implemented in the next few years (I'm not sure about how or when it'll happen). There are some biology classes, intro to chem, and organic chem. Bio is required for all students, and an additional chem/material science class. Cross-registration is rather common, so if you think Olin in most respects is a fit for you, look into it a bit further. I believe you can design your own concentration in general engineering, and take classes outside of Olin.
A lot of what Olin is about is change.. so I'm actually looking forward to more life sciences classes. There are some people in my class that I know of that adore molecular bio/chemistry, including myself. Material science may be a field you will become interested in.
Anyways, Olin's still quite young and still changing; right now, Olin puts little emphasis on it IMHO... I think in the near future, Olin will have more emphasis on bio/chem.</p>
<p>Olin is a great school, but if you really want to major in chemical engineering it may not be the place for you. </p>
<p>You would have to major in Engineering and design a concentration in chemical engineering. The commonly done concentration in biological engineering includes at least 12 credits of appropriate bioengineering coursework, that is, 3 full engineering classes that are biology related (among other requirements). Thus, it's reasonable to say that a chemical enginnering concentration would have to include about the same amount of chemical engineering coursework, and with the classes that Olin offers now that would be difficult. An easier option would be to do a concentration in materials science (which includes solid state chemistry), but that may not be exactly what you want.</p>
<p>Also, in addition to our two biology profs we have a bioe prof and a materials science prof who works with biomaterials and offers biomaterials classes, which allows Olin to offer a greater number of biology and bioengineering classes. So far (as far as bio and chem type stuff) I've taken Modern Biology, Human Molecular Genetics, Immunology, Cell Bioengineering, and Structural Biomaterials all at Olin, and I'm taking Tissue Engineering, Chemistry, a self-study in Advanced Biostatistics, and Microscopy next semester.</p>
<p>There is someone designing a ChemE concentration, so it has been/is being done. She is having to take classes off campus, but she's making it work.</p>