Declaring a Major

Students who have not declared a major receive administrative and advising services from Undergraduate Advising, 615 Goodell.

How to Declare Your Major
The process of changing your major is very simple:

1. Obtain a “Change of Major Form” from the Registrar’s Office or from Undergraduate Advising.

2. Get an acceptance signature from your old departmental undergraduate adviser of your new major.

3. Obtain a release signature from your old department.

4. Bring page 3 (pink copy) of the form to your new major department.

5. The top page (white original) will be sent by the old department to the Registrar’s Office.

Restrictions: Because of increased popularity and enrollment, a few majors in the Colleges of Arts and Sciences have found it necessary to restrict entry into the major. The admission processes and criteria are described for each of these in the department’s section in this Guide.

For the same reasons, the Isenberg School of Management, the College of Engineering, and the School of Nursing, and several other majors, have devised similar restrictions.

When to Declare Your Major
Many students find that choosing a major takes time. With the help of an academic adviser, students can plan a course of study that enables them to confirm their choice or declare a major before the end of their third semester of enrollment or the completion of 45 semester credits.

Some majors (e.g., Sociology, English, Classics, Judaic Studies, and many others in the Humanities and Social Sciences) have relatively few requirements and allow much room for taking electives or building up minor areas of concentration in related fields. Other majors (such as Music, Biochemistry, or Physics) have many required courses with specific sequences, and prerequisites which should be started in the freshman year. Students may make up for changing majors late by staying at the University for up to ten semesters, or by taking required courses during intersession or summer sessions.

Note: Some departments specify certain times in a semester for entering the major.

When students are not certain about a major, they are well advised to try courses in different departments to find out what they are interested in. They should familiarize themselves with various departments, the faculty, the specialties, and the course offerings, before making a decision.

An academic adviser can help students determine the best options for them. In some cases, courses are available that can be applied to several majors or to General Education requirements. For example, a student who is inclined toward the sciences but is not sure about which field should take introductory chemistry and calculus courses. Not only are these required for about twenty different majors in the sciences and engineering, but a student’s level of achievement and enjoyment in these courses might help him or her decide on an academic direction. Even if some of the courses the student takes turn out to be irrelevant to the eventual major, they will still count toward the 120 credits needed for graduation.

Career Considerations
Enriching a regular bachelor’s degree with carefully chosen electives from other areas is a good way to increase students’ sets of job skills to help them become more competitive in the job market. For example, for students who want to be social workers, a B.A. in Sociology may be supplemented with courses in public health, nutrition, community service or a foreign language to better prepare them for social work in an urban area.

Changing Your Major
Often students need to change from one major to another or from a specific major to Undeclared. In the first case, they should visit the new department to discuss the requirements needed to complete the new major. If students need to complete required courses before they can declare their new major, or if they would like to explore options that they had not considered earlier, it may be possible for them to change to Undeclared. To do so, they should:

1. Obtain a “Change of Major” form from the Registrar’s Office or the Academic Dean’s Office for Undergraduate Advising, Goodell 607.

2. Discuss their intentions with a member of the Academic Dean’s staff during drop-in hours and obtain an acceptance signature.

3. Obtain a release signature from their old department.

4. Bring page 1 (white original), page 2 (yellow student copy) and page 3 (pink copy) to 607 Goodell.

5. The top page (white form) will be sent to the Registrar’s Office by the dean’s staff in 607 Goodell.