I rarely follow conventional paths, especially in education. Why start now?
Western Washington offers a wide variety of majors and minors, but my interests and aptitudes focus on two specific fields: Computer Science, and Neuroscience.
I’m left with two options:
- Double major in two highly competitive and demanding disciplines.
- Major in one discipline and minor in the other.
Neither of these options make sense; double majoring would significantly extend my time to graduate, while majoring in one field and minoring in the other would prevent me from gaining the broad exposure necessary to receive a comprehensive education across both fields.
There is a third option, and it’s the option I’m taking.
Designing a Custom Major
Western has a little-known program called the Student-Faculty Designed Major, nested within the College of Humanities and Social Sciences. This program allows students to design (with faculty oversight) a custom major distinct from available majors.
With the support of four faculty members across two colleges and four departments (LING, CSCI, DATA, PSY), I have designed a comprehensive program of study that will ultimately award me a major of (tentatively named) Computation and Cognitive Neuroscience.
This program of study features extensive exposure to neuroscience, computer science, data science, linguistics, and mathematics. Neuroscience provides an understanding of psychology and the neural mechanisms underlying behavior and cognition. Linguistics offers an applied exploration of cognition and learning through the study of psycholinguistics and the neurophysiology of language. Computer and data science provide the technical skills to model, simulate, and analyze brain functioning using computational methods.
The goal is to enable me to work in the field of computational neuroscience (or the tangentially related fields of research, data analytics, and medtech) and to prepare for potential graduate studies.
Progress in Process
The Student-Faculty Designed Major program has strict requirements, so building the curriculum has involved multiple discussions with faculty members to ensure all requirements are met and the program sufficiently covers the involved disciplines.
Some of the requirements include:
- At least 45 credits must come from classes in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences.
- The major must include at least 70, but no more than 110, credits.
- At least half of the major’s credits must be from upper-division courses.
- A faculty advisory committee of at least three members must be established.
- A 1-2 page rationale must be submitted and approved by the SFDM committee.
- The program of study must be presented to and approved by the SFDM committee.
So, where am I in the process?
- I have built relationships with four faculty members, all willing to sit on my faculty advisory committee.
- The program of study has been developed, shared with, and approved by these faculty members.
- I am currently writing the rationale to submit to the SFDM committee.
Once I complete the rationale, I will meet with the director of the SFDM program for preliminary approval before submitting and presenting my program of study and rationale. Afterward, the committee will either approve or reject the program.
Then the real work begins: completing the courses and earning a B.S. in Computation and Cognitive Neuroscience.
Wish me luck ;)