I recently posted a discussion about majoring in biology, but I just completely changed my mind and decided to go for IR/History and maybe even double major in English as well. The IR major lists these classes as “core requirements”:
Econ 101
Econ 102
Econ 213 or 214 or 220
HIST 205
POL3 221
In addition to these, I’m assuming I will still need to complete distribution requirements?
Another question I have relates to my advisers. Will I have to inform my school that I have changed my mind on a major or does the school not even record information about your major until orientation? I have been going through the course catalog as much as possible but it is still a little bit overwhelming so any information someone has would be helpful!
The major you put down on your application isn’t binding, so you’re probably fine there. For distribution requirements, you’ll have a lot of overlap between classes for your major and graduation requirements. I think the course catalog lists which distribution requirements each class fulfills, so keep an eye out for that.
@oellis81 You don’t technically have a major until you declare one in March of your sophomore year. You can change your mind as many times as you want between now and then and probably even after then.
That said, you’ll probably get assigned an advisor who works in the Bio department or a related science because that’s what they think you want to do, so I’d call them and ask them to assign you one who works in the History or English department. But an advisor in any department will know what to do to help you make your schedule.
Since you are considering being an English major of some sort, and double majoring, you should try to get WRIT 105 as your First Year Writing assigned class. This one also counts to fulfill ENG 120, which is required for English majors, so in essence, you’ll kill two birds with one stone (although you have to meet one more time a week than the other writing classes).
So try to take something like:
–WRIT 105 (which knocks of your writing requirement AND your ENG 120 requirement)
–ECON 101 (which knocks off one of your IR requirements as well as your SBA distribution requirement)
–DISTRIBUTION REQUIREMENT Choice 1 (recommend math or science with lab while it’s fresh in your brain)
–DISTRIBUTION REQUIREMENT Choice 2 (recommend foreign language if you don’t place out, art, or something interesting to you that is not an SBA or HS or even LL (since you’ll fulfill those in your English major designation)
–PHYSICAL EDUCATION (you register for these later)
Make sure neither of these DIST REQ choices count as a HS or SBA, because your HIST 205 class that you have to take later on will fulfill HS requirement, and ECON 101 fulfills the SBA requirement. In other words, try to knock some off in your choices that won’t be fulfilled by the classes you have to take in your major. This will give you the most flexibility later.
I hope this makes sense. Your advisor will have a worksheet and there are tons of ways this could be set up so don’t fret if this isn’t the exact plan you end up with.
Thank you so much!! This seriously helps