<p>Got accepted to CALS as a biological engineer, wrote an extremely passionate essay about how much I want to study the biomedical engineering concentration, join ec's related to it, etc, but that interest slowly transformed towards an interest towards food science since I submitted my app. I know some people may suggest that I wait one semester and try bioE out first, but I think I've made my mind up on food science. Would I be allowed to change my major prior to 1st semester? Also, is it alright if I have a change in interest, or would it be somewhat dishonest that I got accepted due to my passion for bioE, but then ended up majoring in food science right away?</p>
<p>When do CALS students usually declare a major?</p>
<p>you apply to directly to a specific major in CALS, so I guess you basically declare your major as soon as you’ve been accepted.</p>
<p>I do not know how long it would take to change to food science. I believe that the engineering requirements are quite specific, but if you have any electives built in, take an intro food science course. also, there should be some overlap in requirements for food science and BEE, so if you take chemistry, an intro bio course, and calculus, among your first semester courses, I imagine that would be acceptable for either major. you should look up the requirements for both online, and then you can see if this is the case. </p>
<p>it’s not difficult to switch into Food Science, so I don’t think you’ll have too much trouble with the administrative side of things. I am not sure off the top of my head of the exact policy about when you can switch majors.
definitely don’t worry about the sincerity of your admissions essay. it did its job by helping you get accepted, and now you can do what you want. I bet if I were to go look at my own essay, there would be some aspects of what I said that have changed/evolved over the past three years, but I also think that’s entirely appropriate.</p>
<p>if you do end up taking a semester of mostly engineering-related courses, I don’t think that should be too bad. the general background of engineering will probably be relevant and useful to food science (as opposed to if you wanted to transfer to French lit studies or something else very very different.)</p>
<p>I could check on the conjectures in this post more carefully if you want, but this at least should get you started.</p>