You're Majoring in What?

Have you ever considered a major in limnology or gerontology? Maybe a major in adventure recreation and leisure services sounds more appealing. How about dedicating your college career to a major in biblical languages, historic preservation, or food sciences?

Whether you’ve heard of these areas of study or not, they are all, in fact, new degrees offered to students at universities and colleges across the nation. Higher education is continually shifting to meet the needs of our culture and the world as a whole, but the second millennia has given birth to a vast array of new fields of everything from biotechnology and immunology to landscape design and ranch management. This isn’t the education that was available to college students even a decade ago, and the possibilities are endless as schools everywhere expand their programs to include non-traditional areas of study.

“My mother was here visiting one time [and] found a fact sheet about the up-and-coming major,” says Elise Sharpio, an electronic media arts and communication (EMAC) major at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y. “The EMAC program quickly became the perfect fit for me.”

The EMAC program, which began over a decade ago as merely a concentration of study for communication students, is now a unique major at Rensselear Polytechnic Institute (RPI). Graduates of EMAC could follow careers into graphic design, advertising, or multimedia production. EMAC is a multidisciplinary area of study focusing on integrating both technology and the arts, which is often the focus of the newest majors.

“I look at the skills I’ve learned at RPI as a full package deal,” says Sharpio. “I’ve become a jack of all trades.”

Jesse Littleton, an African studies and philosophy double major at St. Lawrence University, is pleased with his decision to declare the new African studies major as the focus of his educational experience. “I was in Kenya for four months, and I sort of fell in love with it. I also think the experiences I had in Kenya, along with the coursework, can provide framework for similar careers,” says Littleton. “Travel is important to me, but I hate being the ignorant tourist.”

Although some of the fastest-growing occupations in the country for college grads are physician assistants, data communication analysts, and dental hygienists, the courses corresponding with new degrees offered to students often reflect current economic, political, and social situations as well.

“Aging studies is interdisciplinary,” says John Krout, professor and director of the Gerontology Institute at Ithaca College. “The movement of 76 million ‘baby boomers’ into their later years has spawned much interest and concern by the government about its impact on programs like Social Security and Medicare.”