Questions about Stanford courses, majors, etc.

Colleges and Universities A-Z Stanford University
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<p>Alright, first things first- is it easy to switch majors? When exactly do you have to declare your major, and do you get a good sampling of other subjects before this is required?</p>

<p>I was browsing around the Stanford website, and saw that the school is divided into 7 different schools, 3 of which are for undergraduates. Is it possible (or common practice) to take courses across different schools? For example, I'm interested in majoring in English (so the school of Humanities & Sciences) but would also like to take classes in the school of Earth Sciences. Is this possible?</p>

<p>Finally, how is the english department regarded at Stanford? I'm assuming that (as at all top schools) it's excellent, although your opinion would be appreciated! Thanks!</p>

<p>and, this isn't quite in the thread of the other questions, but are there a lot of NJ students at Stanford?</p>

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<p>I’ve never switched majors personally, but I’ve been told it’s easy.</p>

<p>Typically the deadline is to declare by spring of your sophomore year. </p>

<p>My advice is to take as many interesting intro classes as you can, and take introsems. They give you a good idea about different majors, especially ones that are not as popular, like anthropology and math. And, math in high school is very different from math in college, - so really, taking the intro class at the least is important before declaring.</p>

<p>And yeah, taking an earth science class or engineering class is easy. You just… sign up on axess. If you’re thinking about taking graduate-level classes, that’s a different story, but that too can be done.</p>

<p>English department is top-notch. If you care about USWNR: [Best</a> English Programs | Top Humanities Schools | US News Best Graduate Schools](<a href=“http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-humanities-schools/english-rankings]Best”>http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-humanities-schools/english-rankings)</p>

<p>There it is, #2. And if you’re thinking creative writing, two words: Tobias Wolff. English is… I think the 5th most popular major at Stanford. Also, the Stanford in Oxford study abroad program is supposed to be amazing for English majors. Tutorials are supposed to be intense… but totally boss.</p>

<p>Mmm I think there were two people from NJ in my dorm of about 70 people. And I knew a handful of others. Obviously there aren’t a whole bunch, but there are definitely some.</p>

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<p>thanks for the thorough response! I never realized just how well-respected the English dept. was! And interesting about the relatively small population of NJ students… </p>

<p>I do have a few more questions:</p>

<p>Do students commonly double major? Major and minor? Is doing either one of these ungodly difficult?</p>

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<p>Almost half of students are from California, so yeeup. </p>

<p>Depends. Generally: Double-majoring isn’t common at all. Doing a major and minor is reasonable, somewhat common. A lot of people come in and say that they want to double major and double minor, etc etc. It’s tough. </p>

<p>Not trying to make this too complicated, so:</p>

<p>Double major with:
engineering + any other major = no no nooooooo
public policy + english (social science + humanity) = possible but very very difficult.
english + philosophy (two humanities) = possible ( :
english + biology (humanity + science) = possible, but most people wouldn’t want to do that anyway</p>

<p>Major/minor with anything = possible if you really want to do it</p>

<p>If you want, I can forward you a list of 11 most popular majors. It gives a list of dept contact info and intro classes to take.</p>

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<p>Yeah, I’d be much more interesting in pursuing a major/minor than a double major (and glad to hear that majoring/minoring isn’t uncommon). Thanks again for the respone, and that list of dept. contact info would be great!</p>

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<p>Jake and Finn: Could you send me that list too? I would really appreciate it.</p>

<p>Thanks so much, if you don’t mind.</p>

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<p>mhm if you guys wanna PM me your emails, i’ll forward the doc to you.</p>

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<p>“engineering + any other major = no no nooooooo”</p>

<p>Why do you say this? I was planning to do exactly that, major in engineering and perhaps Economics</p>

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<p>I guess if you’re super motivated and get started from the beginning, it’s possible.</p>

<p>There are 3 quarters per year, and I’m guessing you want to graduate in 4 years. Each quarter you can take between 12 and 20 units. If you were to max out on units every quarter (which is insane), you’d graduate with 240 units (20 units x 3 quarters x 4 years).</p>

<p>To graduate, you need 180 units, which averages out to 15 units per quarter, which is manageable.</p>

<p>Economics is 80 units. You can not transfer credit from AP, so 80 units must be taken at Stanford.</p>

<p>I’m pretty sure that CS is about 90 units, although some classes can transfer from high school (i.e. math, maybe physics). Other types of engineering, like civilE and chemE are 120 units.</p>

<p>So majoring in economics (80 units) + engineering (90-120 units) would be very tough, even if you got maybe 10-15 units of credit from AP.</p>

<p>And you have to factor in the GER requirements, like IHUM (12 units), PWR1 & 2 (8 units), depth requirements like american studies, global communication, etc. That’s probably about 40 extra units that are unrelated to your major. </p>

<p>So 40 + 80 + 90 = 210. Technically speaking, it’s possible, but you’d really have to hit the ground running. </p>

<p>If you somehow wanted to do civil E + economics, it’d be 40 + 120 + 80 = 240, and you’d be at the max. Don’t underestimate 20 units, especially if it’s made up of classes in math/physics/engineering/chemistry. Consider finals week when you might have back-to-back 3-hr finals.</p>

<p>Check out ughb.stanford.edu for 4-year plans for engineering.</p>

<p>If you can manage to double major in economics and engineering, I will have a whole lot of respect for you. But I don’t know, I think it’s pretty clear why most people don’t double major with engineering. Sorry if this was confusing. It’ll make more sense after your first quarter when you understand what 15 vs 20 units of science and math really feels like.</p>