Flexibilty of choices in Berkeley?

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of California - Berkeley
1

<p>My humanities-loving D is considering Berekeley. So far, her main interests are languages and music. Possible majors/minors are linguistics, international relations, some particular language or two ... and/or music. And we heard that all of that at Cal are of good quality and, unlike math/science/busyness/economics, are not too competitive, both in terms of getting into classes and succeeding in them.</p>

<p>But, as right now we have no idea how DD will earn her living in the future, we try to urge her to try some classes from computer science and/or economics - either, to supplement her "impractical" major/minor with some useful knowledge/skills (for being more employable), or, if lucky, to find new interests ... even, maybe, change/add the major/minor.</p>

<p>Will that be a problem at Cal? I have heard that all "useful" majors (like CS, Engineering, Economics, Busyness etc.) in UCs are impacted ones. How hard is it for a humanities major to get into computer or economics classes? How hard to change the direction in the middle of u/g studies?</p>

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<p>My son, heading into his junior year, just changed his major yesterday. Again. It isn't hard in the humanities department. One thing your daughter can do is to create her own major at Cal and figure out a way (with an advisor) to connect the practical subjects she wants to take with the other subjects she is interested in. Any kid can create their own major at Cal; it is simply a matter of presenting a cohesive course of study and getting an advisor to sign on. I think the official name is Interdisciplinary Studies. Seems like it would be easy to connect things like International Relations and Economics.</p>

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<p>How hard is it for a humanities major to get into computer or economics classes?</p>

<p>While she'll be at a disadvantage in terms of enrollment priority, she should still be able to have a good shot at getting in. There are a lot of people in classes like CS 61A and Econ 1 who aren't CS and Econ majors.</p>