Hands fill plates at a buffet.Jupiterimages
Emily Marasco's days can begin with music studies, move on to calculus and computer labs and finish with an orchestra rehearsal or a private oboe lesson.
Ms. Marasco, a third-year student at the University of Calgary , leads a double life, juggling a packed timetable filled with the requirements of two very different disciplines—computer engineering and music. "You shouldn't have to choose between two things that you love," says the 19-year-old Calgary native, summing up an outlook that increasingly is being embraced by universities and students across the country.
In a complex world where career paths are just as likely to zigzag as follow a straight line, there is something to be said for an undergraduate education that exposes students to a range of subjects, either through specially designed programs and courses or by allowing them to craft their own combinations like Ms. Marasco has.
Such an approach exposes students to different ways of tackling questions and acquiring knowledge, education experts say. Think of it as an academic smorgasbord that can bring results unlikely to be found by ordering straight from the fixed menu. "The more you understand about different curriculum areas the more you are going to be able to think outside the box," says Barrie Bennett, a professor at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education who examines how students learn. Research shows such a broad approach also enriches meaning and makes students more eager to learn, he says. "Smart teachers have been doing this for a long time."
In the case of Ms. Marasco, her seemingly unrelated passions have led her to work on acoustics and a software program that lets young musicians compare their sound patterns with those of professional musicians as a way of improving their playing. The musician and engineer has found plenty of overlap in her studies. Math is about patterns, she says, and so is music. "A lot of people don't see that. It's just if you look at it from an artistic or a technical perspective."
Such talk is music to the ears of educators who are busy building bridges across academic boundaries.
Some schools, such as York University and the University of King's College in Halifax, are trying to give as many undergraduates as possible exposure to an interdisciplinary approach through required courses. Other universities are focusing their efforts on specific programs. Several offer small elite programs geared to top students who excel in arts and science.
Faculties are also creating degrees that span disciplines such as environmental and integrated sciences, international development, digital media and biomedical engineering. Others are less formal, such as the "Terry" project at the University of British Columbia , a campus-wide initiative aimed at getting undergrads thinking about global issues. Terry in this case is a play on Terra, or Earth.
With so many projects and programs it is difficult to measure just how significant this movement to a broader undergraduate education really is. At the University of Alberta , Olive Yonge, the vice-provost of academic programs, has taken to putting a sticky note on her office wall every time she comes across a new interdisciplinary course or program at the school. "No one was really keeping track of it," she explains.
While it's not a scientific study, she has put up 27 notes in the past year—a sign, she says, that momentum is growing for such initiatives.
That momentum is being fed by academics such as Ed Jernigan, a professor at the University of Waterloo and a true believer in the importance of an education that crosses many disciplines.
Prof. Jernigan, a systems design engineer, is the director of the university's new Centre for Knowledge Integration, which accepted its first batch of 40 undergraduates this year. Given how quickly knowledge is developing, he argues, the ability to adapt and make connections is the skill that needs to be honed. "Specialization leads to extinction in a changing world," he says at one point during a passionate recounting of how the new degree program came about. Prof. Jernigan hopes the program's graduates will become the link between groups of specialists who increasingly need to talk with each other. The 20th century, he says, was the age of specialization. "Maybe it was too much of a good thing."
Ryley Kornelsen, a member of the program's first class, says she picked it rather than chemical engineering because she hopes it will change the way she sees things. While some of her friends see the program as a way to delay picking a direction, she says she made a conscious decision to try a new path. "I chose not to choose," says Ms. Kornelsen, whose timetable includes French and zoology as well as math. "I want to learn everything."
The new degree program includes core courses designed to give students the ability to gain and integrate knowledge from a range of disciplines in both the arts and the sciences. As well, like other more established arts and science programs, the Waterloo degree gives students enough flexibility to specialize in a particular area.
Eric Kennedy, another student in the program, is planning a future in politics but is also enrolled in honours math. "It's the best of both worlds," he says, although he admits he's a little nervous about the math.
Of course, the idea of a well-rounded university education is hardly a new concept, but many educators say they believe students such as Ms. Kornelsen and Mr. Kennedy are fuelling an increased demand.
"Students have changed, there is no doubt about it," says Serge Desmarais, associate vice-president academic at the University of Guelph . The school offers an arts and science degree as well as an assortment of first-year seminar courses open to all students. The seminars, with titles such as "Understanding Why We Eat What We Eat," and "Forbidden Knowledge and Dangerous Ideas," have become so popular the school is struggling to find ways to meet demand.
"Students pull you along," Prof. Desmarais says. "For them the world is so small. They have Facebook contacts in Thailand. They have much broader horizons."
Encouraging students to expand their horizons before specializing was a founding principal at Toronto's York University . For close to 50 years it has required arts and science students to take courses outside their main disciplines and describes itself as the country's "interdisciplinary university."
Sheila Embleton, the school's vice-president academic, says special humanities courses that are a requirement for all arts and science students draw on a range of disciplines. It's a practice that she believes creates a more open-minded undergraduate population. These students must also take a social science course, and a natural science course is mandatory for arts students.
"We have to know how to talk each other's language in order to solve a problem," says Prof. Embleton, who as an undergrad majored in math and linguistics, an unconventional combination at the time. "When you look at many of the issues or topics in society, seldom is there a linear answer."
Competing forces are influencing students who are considering their university options, says Peter Sutherland, director of the arts and science program at McMaster University , which was started in the early 1980s.
Interdisciplinary programs may be appealing, but he says many students face pressure from parents to choose a course of study that they believe leads more directly to a job such as engineering or business.
"The arts and science program in many ways is for those students who are less certain about what they want to do and whose parents allow them the luxury of thrashing around for a while," he says. This, even though a large proportion of graduates from the McMaster program go on to graduate and professional programs such as law and medicine. The high-school grade average for entry into the program generally runs in the low to mid-90s.
Indeed, while many educators sing the praises of interdisciplinary programs and combined majors, students involved in these studies make up only a small percentage of those on Canadian campuses.
At the University of Calgary, Ann Tierney, head of student and enrolment services, says students such as Ms. Marasco who take combined degree programs represent about 5% of the undergraduate population.
Splitting time between two faculties takes dedication and careful planning to ensure that the requirements of both departments are met. It generally means more work for students and academic advisers to help co-ordinate timetables and study paths.
Ms. Marasco says her desire to study both music and engineering likely means it will take her an extra year to get her degree. This year, she also has cut back on her music courses, switching to a minor in order to lessen her workload and the sprints across campus required to get from one faculty to the other.
She also belongs to a new music society within the engineering department and is making a few dollars performing at special events. About 50 engineers have joined the group, suggesting she is far from the only student in that department with a love of music.
As for her future, Ms. Marasco is thinking about a masters in acoustics or music engineering, but entertainment law is also on her list. Either way, she says she will use the skills she has acquired in both sides of her academic life.
A number of universities offer programs, degrees and courses that are designed to expose students to a range of disciplines. some examples:
ARTS & SCIENCE COMBINATIONS
These programs are generally geared to high achievers who can hold their own in both calculus and poetry class. Established programs include Hamilton's McMaster University , McGill University in Montreal and the University of Guelph .
Many programs include specialized required classes such as the Inquiry course at McMaster University, where the 60-member class is broken into three groups to study issues in a particular region of the developing world. Variations on this theme include the new Knowledge Integration program at the University of Waterloo .
CROSS-DISCIPLINARY DEGREES
An increasing number of established faculties are joining forces to create new degrees that span traditional disciplines. Some of the most popular areas include the environment and international development. Other combinations pair science with business or science with social sciences.
DO IT YOURSELF
Some universities do their best to help students who want to combine majors that traditionally do not go together. York University , for example, allows students to combine any majors. Administrators caution that this route can take longer and often requires planning of timetables and courses—not to mention some sprints across campus.
FOUNDATION COURSES
A popular way to introduce incoming students to a range of subjects. Often these courses take a look at one topic from a variety of perspectives, such as the Humanities courses at York University or first-year seminars offered at other schools. The University of King's College in Halifax offers the granddaddy of such programs in Canada. Its foundation year program is a single course that fills most of the timetable and exposes students to great works and ideas starting with the Ancient Greeks and ending with the postmoderns.