Minors in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences

The following text is taken from the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Policy on Minors, approved April 14, 2015.

Except where the CLAS rules are more stringent, the University’s rules for Minors will apply to all Minors in the College.

  1. A Minor in CLAS must be in either (i) a discipline represented by an undergraduate major or a department or program of the College or (ii) an interdisciplinary area that promotes the academic goals of the College. When a Minor is offered by a single department or program, the Minor shall have the same name as (i) the department or program or (ii) a major offered by the department or program. Any department or program with multiple majors may offer multiple Minors, but at most one Minor for each major. Any department or program lacking its own major may nevertheless offer a Minor. An interdisciplinary minor must be sponsored by more than one department or program.
  2. Minors must require at least 15 credits of 2000-level course work or higher. The departments or programs sponsoring an interdisciplinary minor must be able to indicate that consent has been granted by other departments or programs to include among its requirements any courses not offered by the sponsoring departments or programs.
  3. Students may not major and minor in the same discipline.  However, a student who has graduated with a minor may return and earn an additional degree with a major in the same discipline as that minor. In the case of an interdisciplinary minor, the sponsoring departments or programs must explicitly indicate if students in majors offered by those departments or programs are not allowed to elect the interdisciplinary minor.
  4. Students may count the same course towards a major and a different minor. (This will happen rarely, mainly where a major requires courses outside the main department.)
  5. If a department or program wishes to add or revise a minor, an appropriate proposal must be submitted to the CLAS CC&C. A proposal for a Minor in CLAS should clearly indicate:
    1. the core concepts and questions considered integral to the discipline;
    2. the courses that students may choose among for the Minor; and
    3. how those courses cover the core material.