I’m a high school senior and I’m thinking about majoring in Math and Stats and possible cognitive science. I know it’s gonna be a lot of work but is it possible to triple major in those subjects at Rice? And also, can people give me some suggestions on what schools have an easier double/triple major policy?
Case Western Reserve University would probably be easy to get a lot of classes in cognitive science, math and states.
Its easier to get into compared to Rice. Rice is a very small school that tends to take almost half Texas students, or used to. If you are not a National Merit Finalist, Rice may be tough. If you are National Merit, Rice will probably accept you, if everything else is in place. Try to visit Houston to be sure you like it. Case Western is a bit more liberal politically than the Rice student body.
Colleges with notably flexible curricula – Amherst, Hamilton, Smith, Brown, Grinnell – would seem to be among those most accommodating to students interested in multiple majors. Not all of these schools offer specialized programs in your areas of interest, though you would encounter options among mathematics, linguistics, philosophy, biology, psychology, neuroscience and computer science. You might also want to consider the University of Rochester.
U of Rochester allows undergrads a fifth year to do a triple major and its Tuition FREE ! I know triple majors at Rochester. Nice option. You have to pay for the fifth year of housing. If you plan to earn a lot of IB and AP credits
that will also help you at Case or Rochester to study three subjects. Rochester and Case are very similar
size and quality. One is near Lake Erie and one is near Lake Ontario. Rochester gets more snow and Case gets
more rain and warmer weather.
Many students at Rice double major. A triple major would be difficult because Rice also requires its students to fulfill distribution requirements by taking some classes in various areas of the Rice curriculum, such as humanities and social sciences, in addition to their classes in their chosen major. Rice is very generous in giving credit for AP scores (4s and 5s). Your interests overlap somewhat. You will take some Stats classes if you major in Cog Sci and some math classes if you major in Statistics. The pure math major does not have too much overlap. See the requirements for a Stat major here. https://statistics.rice.edu/undergraduate-program/BA-statistics. See the requirements for Cog Sci here https://ga.rice.edu/programs-study/departments-programs/social-sciences/cognitive-sciences/cognitive-sciences-ba/#requirementstext. The requirements for a math major are: https://ga.rice.edu/programs-study/departments-programs/natural-sciences/mathematics/mathematics-bs/#requirementstext Finally, the distribution requirements are found here. https://ga.rice.edu/undergraduate-students/academic-policies-procedures/graduation-requirements/
About the AP credit, how exactly can I receive credit for the AP classes that I took? I already sent the admission office my AP scores, but do I need to contact anyone else at Rice to get credit for these classes?
As a senior, yet to start college, give yourself time to take classes, explore, before thinking you need to finalize this now.
You aren’t in at Rice yet, right? You can google a college’s AP credit policy and process. This is usually handled by the registrar’s office. AFTER you start college.
Thank you so much for the information Houston1021!! I looked at the requirement and decided maybe I should do something like double major and a minor.
I’ll only have 7 APs by the time of graduation, they are probbaly all going to be 5’s except for one. I took multivariable calculus junior year and linear algebra / differential equations senior year, do those credit also transfer to colleges (Rice or other schools)?
And also, other than flexible curriculum, what are some schools that have real accessible undergraduate research opportunities? I feel like every school’s website says that but I’m wondering which schools really value research. Does anyone have some knowledge about that? thanks a lot
Rice publishes a list each year of AP credits they accept for Rice credit. You send the score officially from the College Board to the school where you matriculate to get the AP credit. Here is Rice’s list from this year. https://registrar.rice.edu/students/ap_credit
For an independent assessment of colleges that may be particularly strong in undergraduate research opportunities, you can read through this list from U.S. News, in which Rice appears: https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/undergrad-research-programs. For maximal faculty guidance of your research, you may want to consider at least some exclusively undergraduate-focused schools along with your university choices.