Everything You Need To Know About Minors

One of my favourite things that I was able to accomplish during my undergraduate studies here at our university was taking a minor. For some context, I am studying Professional Communication and doing a double minor (so two minors) in Politics and News Studies. Minors are a great way to explore other areas of interest aside from your major! Here is everything you need to know about minors (I promise the concept is a lot easier than you may think).

Major:

• The subject that's the main focus of your degree 
• Most of your courses will be related to your major and you'll graduate with a degree in that major

Minor: 

• A minor is a secondary subject that complements your major
• It is typically  a subject that is of interest to you
• Minors are often taken to further support your career choices

As you know, my major is Professional Communication, and I am doing a minor in Politics as well as another one in News Studies. Both politics and news studies are subjects that I find interesting, and they complement my major and support my career plans.

Professional Communication is a fairly general program with students having a wide range of desired career paths after graduation. You can go into public relations, fashion, marketing, business, etc. To narrow down and create focus within my degree, I knew I wanted to go into something that involved news studies and politics. These both work well with communication and provide me with a wider range of opportunities for jobs and experience in my fields of interest when I graduate.

At our university, we have over 70 different options for minors within a wide range of subject areas. Most minors require you to take six courses from the list of options available. You then apply for your minor when it’s time to graduate. When you declare your intention to graduate, you select the minor, the school checks that you’ve met the requirements and ta-da!

My biggest tip is to incorporate your required minor courses into your major’s schedule. So, for example, most majors will require you to take open electives and courses from different tables to fulfill the major. Some of the courses needed for your minor can also be found in these tables. By taking these courses, you’re able to fulfill the course for your major and have it count towards your minor!

Overall, I have loved taking courses for my minors and I encourage students to take at least one minor during their undergraduate studies! It looks great when you graduate, it opens up more job opportunities and it allows you to take classes in additional subject areas you find interesting. I hope this helped!

XOXO - Eva Oseen