<p>In college I plan to double major in computer science and chemistry. Ideally, I would have a career in computational chemistry. Do you think a double major in these disciplines would be a good idea or is it just asking to be buried in work for years? I don't mind work because I know how to manage my time.</p>
<p>Sometimes it’s not just a matter of time management, but of what you can reasonably fit in. CS and chem would have very little overlap in major requirements (maybe some calculus), so beyond that you are going to just have a LOT of classes to take. If you want to go into computational biology, you might be better off getting relevant experience while in college instead of trying to prove your qualifications with classes; this would be more meaningful to graduate schools, I think.
With this in mind, it might make more sense to major in chemistry and minor in math, or vice versa. Or, some schools might offer a dual major which combines the requirements of both and only results in taking ~1.5x as many classes as a single major, instead of 2x as many. (I know someone who is currently doing this with math and biology with plans to go into computational biology.)</p>
<p>You’re not gonna need a full CS major. You’d be better off minoring, in my opinion, for a few reasons:
-CS tends to have a low minor/major ratio in terms of classes needed, i.e. compared to the major, the minor doesn’t require a whole lot. Fields at the other end of the spectrum are generally science and math BAs.
-Upper-level CS classes are probably not going to be very useful to you. They mainly involve networks, data structures, and complex algorithms.
-Per nanotechnology, there’s very little overlap. In fact, at my school the CS major requires as much English as it does math.
-CS projects take forever. It’s not by any means a light degree.</p>
<p>Personally, as someone who’s spent several years in the workforce and witnessed many ups and downs in the economy, I view a double major as absolutely critical. It gives you more options when you graduate, in case your first choice doesn’t pan out or pan out right away. Of course, it will always be more difficult, but that I would think would be a plus for employers and graduate schools. Test the waters, if those particular majors are to challenging together you could switch one to a less demanding major.</p>
<p>I don’t see anything wrong with starting out taking the requirements for both. It gives you the flexibility to choose one but also the option of keeping both. Plus, even if you drop CS or reduce it to a minor, having those basic programming skills is still REALLY useful.</p>