<p>1) How good is the sociology department at UChicago?
2) How difficult is it to double major in econ and sociology, versus econ and poli sci?
3) What's the major breakdown at UChicago i.e. what percentage of the student body is in each major? (I've definitely seen a pdf with this sort of information floating around before, perhaps from the convocation program, but can't seem to locate it.)</p>
<p>Thanks in advance.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Generally, among the best in the world. Not that it matters much anymore, but I believe the University of Chicago was the first university anywhere to establish a Department of Sociology and to award degrees in the subject as a separate discipline, and for a long time it was dominant in the field. Today, it’s one of a number of really strong departments at American universities.</p></li>
<li><p>I don’t know specifically, but econ and anything is not that difficult because econ has comparatively few requirements and no required senior thesis. Economics can be a really hard major if you challenge yourself, but it doesn’t have to be really hard, as long as you are reasonably strong at math. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>In theory, there is lots of overlap between economics and sociology. Gary Becker, a Nobel Prize winner for economics, and until his recent death probably the dominant figure in the Chicago Economics Department, actually had a joint appointment in Economics and Sociology. In practice, the faculties of the two departments tend to cluster at opposite ends of the political spectrum, with a few exceptions. (I visited the Sociology Department office at Chicago one day a few years ago, and the then-Director of Graduate Studies was wearing a t-shirt that said “I Am Being Fisted By The Invisible Hand.”)</p>
<p>I don’t know nearly as much about political science at Chicago.</p>
<p>One alternative to double majoring in economics and is the Public Policy major, which is often viewed as Economics Lite plus effectively a minor in some other social science field.</p>
<ol>
<li>The University of Chicago Registrar publishes quarterly reports that, among tons of other useful data, tell you exactly how many undergraduates have a current declared first, second, or third major in each field. You can find them here: <a href=“https://registrar.uchicago.edu/page/enrollment-statistics[/url]”>https://registrar.uchicago.edu/page/enrollment-statistics</a> The Spring 2014 report, which just came out, tells you that, counting double majors, there were 947 Economics majors, 365 Political Science majors, and 80 Sociology majors, out of a total of about 4,000 students eligible to declare majors. At the recent convocation, there were 297 baccalaureate degrees awarded in Economics, 130 in Political Science, and 33 in Sociology (those numbers also count double-majors; the total number of graduates was 1,112).</li>
</ol>
<p>The National Center for Education Statistics College Navigator page lets you see the breakdown by major of degrees awarded in some recent year for every college. <a href=“http://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/[/url]”>http://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/</a> The figures there are limited to first majors, and cover a 12-month period.</p>