<p>My son recently told me that he's considering applying to Rice, class of 2014. My guess is that it has a lot to do with location - he'd love to be in the south - and some general statements he heard about how good a school Rice is. But still, this was surprising to me in that he's not much of a hard science student. His grades are good enough but he's never shown any interest in science or math at all and has said he would never major in them.</p>
<p>OTOH he's very much of a humanities student first, social sciences second. I could easily see him majoring in journalism, English, philosophy, classics, history, political science, psychology, etc.</p>
<p>But writing is most important of all. I could even see myself vetoing any school that doesn't seem like it offers great opportunities to improve one's writing skills during the four years there.</p>
<p>So how would he do at Rice? Could he find great learning opportunities in humanities and social sciences and especially could he get the experiences and feedback to improve his writing?</p>
<p>If you’re talking about creative writing, then there are opportunities, but one of my frustrations with Rice is that the English major does not encourage creative writing at all. The creative writing classes I’ve taken are great, but they only counted towards free electives in my major, not a requirement.</p>
<p>That said, my scholastic writing has improved immensely since I’ve been at Rice. Every so often, after I write a paper I’ll sit back and realize, “I couldn’t have written that two years ago.” That’s an enormously satisfying feeling.</p>
<p>The humanities and social sciences at Rice may not have the national reputation that our engineering departments have, but they’re still really solid, with a lot of great professors. One of the things that matters most in the humanities and social sciences is professor-student interaction, and Rice’s low student:faculty ratio (along with the reduced population of grad students) really helps that.</p>
<p>On top of that, I’ve always been of the mentality that unless you want to go into an extremely specialized field (like architecture, sound production, film, etc.), then you should pick your school first, then your major, then your profession. The odds that you will be majoring in the same thing as you started in are extremely low (I came in thinking I wanted to major in physics; now I’m English and poli sci), so what really matters is how much you enjoy your life during those four years. If you do that, then major and career opportunities will follow.</p>
<p>(But humanities and social sciences at Rice are still great.)</p>
<p>Rice has a good writing lab and lots of support for writing. DD graduated in the social sciences, plus did a lot of humanities and got a wonderful education with lots and lots of close support from profs. DS is doing engineering. The nice thing about Rice is that there is a lot of flexibility in studying in different departments and it’s easy to change majors as interests change.</p>
<p>NYSkins1, it seems like our values are very much in line. We’re much more concerned with value added and enjoyment than with national reputation. So I’m glad that you included your statement of values with your information, which BTW is great to hear.</p>
<p>Right now he hasn’t sorted out if he’s more intersted in creative or journalistic writing. You could make a case for it going either way.</p>
<p>And, BTW, your post was extremely well written.</p>
<p>Since you say your son may be interested in journalistic writing, it’s worth pointing out that there’s no set journalism program, but a handful of Rice graduates do go into journalism after graduating. Because there is no set journalism program, it’s really easy to get involved with the Thresher, which is our weekly paper. When I came into Rice, I was sure that I wanted to go into journalism as a career. I was determined to be editor-in-chief of the Thresher my senior year. I showed extreme dedication from my first week at Rice, and by October I was features editor.</p>
<p>I had quit by Christmas.</p>
<p>I realized that there were too many other things that I wanted to do at Rice, and I wasn’t ready to commit myself that fully to any one thing just yet. But my story demonstrates how easy it is to get involved with the Thresher quickly. Also, I’m on the staff again, and loving it.</p>
<p>I agree completely with NYSkins. I can’t really speak to the creative writing classes or the specifics of the English department, but as a Hispanic studies and political science major, I can say that I feel like I’m receiving an outstanding education at Rice. The Hispanic Studies department is on the small side, but it’s hard to complain when the largest Spanish class I’ve taken only had 15 people. My smallest had four… we had class at a tiny caf</p>