<p>The grad creative writing is ranked second to Iowa's famous Writer's Workshop. But what is the undergrad experience like? I'm a little nervous about hyper-competitive classmates in other subject areas at JHU too, given all the premed and prelaw students. Competitive people are high on my list of reasons to avoid some colleges, but I really want a strong English and creative writing program. Thanks for your suggestions and sharing your impressions.</p>
<p>Not to hijack, but does anyone also know whether it’s possible to double-major or minor in an engineering major + creative writing?</p>
<p>I’m curious about this too, since I’m hoping to major in Computer Science, but I’d really like to explore some writing during college, if possible.</p>
<p>DaVinci92: The only “ranking” of creative writing programs that I’ve heard of is the one you mentioned so I don’t have any quantitative data. However, I did have a few friends who were Writing Seminars majors who really loved the program and the faculty. I believe there is a parent (or two?) who have kids in the Writing Sems program that post here on CC so they may be able to provide some more info about the program. You should also check out one of the [blog</a> entries](<a href=“http://blogs.hopkins-interactive.com/academics/category/writing-seminars/]blog”>http://blogs.hopkins-interactive.com/academics/category/writing-seminars/) on the Hopkins Interactive site that are related to the Writing Sems program. </p>
<p>As for your concern about the competitiveness of other students: I think you’ll find that students at Hopkins are all eager to do well in their classes and willing to work hard to do so. If that’s what you define as competitiveness, then yes, the students are competitive. However, if you’re thinking of students who try to succeed at the expense of others, refusing to help their classmates along the way, then that’s something that you won’t see. I never once experienced any “cutthroat” behavior during my four years at Hopkins and in fact, I found that students (both in the sciences and in the humanities) were very willing and interested in working with each other and helping each other learn and succeed. </p>
<p>Greekfire: I haven’t looked at the exact credit numbers, but I suspect that it would be possible to double major in Writing Sems and Computer Science. Because each major has a “distribution requirement” that requires you to take courses in unrelated fields, your CS courses will fill the distribution requirements for Writing Sems and vice-versa. However, I would encourage you not to go in dead set on doing a double major. It’s very possible to explore creating writing and take as many creative writing courses as you want without majoring in Writing Sems, and by not confining yourself to the requirements of a second major, you still leave yourself the freedom to take classes in other fields that you decided are interesting. If, over time, you end up taking enough classes to get a minor or major in Writing Sems, then go for it. This is the advice I got from two different professors in two different departments when I considered declaring a double major my freshmen and sophomore years and I’m glad I followed it.</p>
<p>I’m fairly certain you cannot minor in Writing Seminars now. You can minor in engineering disciplines however including Applied Math & Stats among others.</p>
<p>First of all the rankings where JHU is second to Iowa came out in 1997. USNWR has chosen not to rank creative writing programs anymore. Since DS is now teaching creative writing at Hopkins I believe the dept should be considered #1 in the country 
. The Atlantic Monthly in 2007 placed JHU in the top 10 graduate programs in the country and top 5 in selectivity. [The</a> Best of the Best - Magazine - The Atlantic](<a href=“http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2007/08/the-best-of-the-best/6049/]The”>The Best of the Best - The Atlantic)
I’ve commented on my son’s 4 years in writing sems here <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/273875-other-johns-hopkins-no-final-exams.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/273875-other-johns-hopkins-no-final-exams.html</a>
As Tanman says the cut-throat climate is generally a myth. However please watch this before considering a career in the Humanities: [YouTube</a> - So you Want to Get a PhD in the Humanities](<a href=“So you Want to Get a PhD in the Humanities - YouTube”>So you Want to Get a PhD in the Humanities - YouTube)</p>
<p>roberthhid–</p>
<p>[YouTube</a> - So you Want to Get a PhD in the Humanities](<a href=“So you Want to Get a PhD in the Humanities - YouTube”>So you Want to Get a PhD in the Humanities - YouTube)
wow that video was funny! lol</p>
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<p>This is not true, you can still minor in Writing Sems.</p>
<p>DaVinci92 – I’m a current Writing Seminars major. If you love writing, you’ll love the major. The course that most freshmen take (Introduction to Fiction & Poetry I, II) can be pretty mediocre, but once you start taking the upper-level courses it’s awesome. All the classes I have taken are extremely relaxed.</p>
<p>Actually WealthOfInformation is right - per the Writing Sems website, the class of 2013 is the last one for whom the Writing Sems minor is offered</p>
<p>You’re right, my apologies. I don’t know a whole lot of freshmen Writing Sems majors (or minors) so I guess I hadn’t heard of the change for the class of 2014 and beyond. </p>
<p>Hopefully this will cause more freshmen to consider majoring in it though. Hopkins makes it really easy (and often encourage) to double major.</p>
This is not accurate in 2017 – JHU web site has information on an undergraduate writing major. Just posting this so any new visitors to this thread will know there currently is an undergrad writing seminars major.
@DaVinci92 Any university, especially one like JHU, will have competitive students. After all, we all want good grades so that we can progress to better things in our futures. At Hopkins, it’s definitely competitive, but I would say it’s a constructive kind of competition. Contrary to popular belief, students don’t sabotage each other. Instead, we band together to finish homework and study for tests. Additionally, I know plenty of Writing Seminars Majors that fit in very well here.
@Greekfire The thing about double majoring, especially for engineers, is that people usually pick two majors that have electives and classes in common. With writing seminars and CS, completing a double major would be very hard and would probably take more than 4 years. My friend wanted to switch to MechE/Writing Sems, but was told he should abandon the prospect, mainly because it would take at least 6 years with summer classes.