Interdisciplinary Studies, BA or BS

Interdisciplinary Inquiry offers students a way to “create their own major” when their academic interests extend beyond traditional disciplinary lines. Proposed interdisciplinary majors that appear designed to avoid particular required courses in established majors will not be approved.

Interested students should email IINQ@tcu.edu with: their proposed topic of inquiry, how that focus contributes to their long-term educational and/or career goals, and the divergent disciplines that can contribute to that focus.

For this major, students are required to take course, “Introduction to Interdisciplinary Studies,” where they learn about the nature of interdisciplinary studies and set their course plan. Students must also take course, “Epistemology and Methods,” and complete a capstone project in course, “Interdisciplinary Inquiry Major Capstone.”

To be eligible to apply, students must have earned a GPA at or above 3.0 and have earned at least 12 semester hours credit. The eligibility of incoming transfer students (who lack a TCU GPA) will be considered on a case-by-case basis.

The proposed program of study must consist of a minimum of 36 semester hours chosen from at least two different academic disciplines; 24 of the hours must be upper-division (30000 or above).

·     No more than 24 hours may be taken from a single academic discipline.

·     A maximum of 6 hours of independent or directed study (or Junior Honors Seminar and Senior Honors Thesis) may be applied to the major. Students in the John V. Roach Honors College interested in pursuing departmental honors may, with the approval of the department chair, do so in one the departments making up their interdisciplinary course of study.

For both the B.A. and B.S. degrees, a minor is required. For the B.A. degree, 4th semester proficiency in a foreign language is required. For the B.S. degree, sufficient coursework of a quantitative nature must be included in the proposed course of study to justify the B.S. degree. The choice between the B.A. and B.S. degrees is to be determined by the nature of the proposed course of study and is subject to the approval of the associate dean.

No course applied to the major may also be applied to the minor.

For more information contact IINQ@tcu.edu