Social Sciences

A Bachelor of Arts in Social Sciences provides a series of options for students who wish to investigate the nature of society and how its structures and institutions affect individuals, groups, and communities. In this program, students concentrate their work in the disciplines of anthropology, history, political science, criminal justice, psychology, sociology, and women’s, gender, and sexuality studies.

Students can complement the courses in the primary concentration with courses from at least one other academic area or department with the advisor's approval. With the direction of an advisor, students can shape programs of study that can be used as preparation for a variety of careers or graduate study.

All students must complete the University-level General Education Requirements as described elsewhere in this catalog. Entering students must have at least a 2.0 transfer GPA. Above and beyond the General Education Requirements, the College of Liberal Arts requires an additional six semester hours of arts and humanities or social science course work, two semester hours of science with a lab, and a foreign language requirement (either two years of the same language in high school or one year of the same language in college).

All social science/humanities majors must complete a minimum of 39 semester hours of departmental course work, 21 of which must be upper-division. Students may organize these 39 departmental credits in one of two ways:

• Earn at least 24 semester hours (of which 15 semester hours must be upper-division) in a chosen primary concentration and at least 15 semester hours (of which 6 semester hours must be upper-division) in a chosen secondary concentration; or
• Combine three closely-related areas, earning at least 9 credits in each.

Beyond the credit distribution requirements, there are no specific course curriculum requirements.

Personnel Psychology/Human Resources Option

The Personnel Psychology/Human Resources (PP/HR) option takes an interdisciplinary approach by drawing from psychology, human development, and management coursework. It is designed to provide human resource professionals, and those preparing for a career in human resources, the tools to be effective managers. 

Students pursuing the Bachelor of Arts in Social Sciences with an emphasis in personnel psychology and human resource management must complete all University General Education Requirements, the additional requirements of the College of Liberal Arts (see Social Sciences description), and a minimum of 40 semester hours of prescribed course work in the major.