Check out The Happy Tortoise. An undergraduate at a liberal arts college writing about science…what's not to like?
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Sean Carroll is offering more unsolicted advice (though it is in response to a comment, which makes it borderline solicited...), this time about choosing an undergraduate school. He breaks the options down into four categories, with two small errors that I'll correct in copying the list over here:…
This is a repost from my old blog, from a year and a half ago. But it's time for academic positions to be advertised - if they haven't been frozen due to budget cuts. So, some old advice on getting a job, while my own job is keeping me especially busy.
So. You want a job, do you? At an…
The Female Science Professor offers some thoughts on institutional hiring:
Only one graduate in the past 10 years from my research group is now a professor at a small liberal arts college, and that person attended a SLAC as an undergraduate. When I was in job-search mode, I got interviews at SLACs…
Are you trained in vertebrate systematics or natural history? Would you like to work at a liberal arts college with undergraduates? We have the perfect opportunity for you.
Tenure-Track Position in Biology
University of Minnesota, Morris
The University of Minnesota, Morris seeks an individual…
Very nice. One question though, since when does biophysics fall under the category of art?
How about 'liberal arts college'?
I may be wrong, but I think that a a Bachelor of Arts allows for a broader undergrad program (with less lab hour credits, for instance), allowing a student to spend more time in other "departments," which seems like a good idea.
Jamie, I certainly do not disagree with a broader undergrad program being a very good idea. I was just curious. I also think that more BA programs should have a greater emphasis on math and science, but that's just me.
Another excellent blogspot, Ontogeny, by an undergraduate zooology major that covers science news, especially biology, with lots of color photos to illustrate the posts is at:
http://mattdowling.blogspot.com/
As a bio major at a small liberal arts college, I gotta chip in. I'm getting a BA, as is everyone other science major. In general, the degree requirements are a bit lighter than they would be at a big university with a dedicated school. There are also a lot of requirements to take classes outside your major. However, this doesn't make it a "lesser" major -- a lot of the science departments here are outstanding.
At most liberal arts schools--at least the ones I've looked at--the difference between a BA and a BS lies in the distribution requirements. So it's possible to get a BA in a scientific discipline; it's also possible to get a BS in the humanities if you have the credit-hours. That the latter is less common says more about what people think makes for a "well-rounded" individual than it does about the validity of such degrees.
My degree in Microbiology was granted by the College of Liberal Arts. At the time we also had the colleges of:
Art
Architecture
Library science
Engineering and Mining Sciences
Agriculture
Teaching
Pharmacy
Medicine
Liberal Arts was 'default container for everything else...'
That college has long since been renamed the College of Arts and Sciences...and it's STILL the 'default container for everything else...'