When Jack Bachman ’27 first came to Brown, he didn’t expect to end up as an English concentrator. But during his third year at Brown, he made the switch from modern culture and media.
Despite switching concentrations three years into his college career, his course load didn’t increase. Bachman had taken English classes before switching concentrations and several MCM courses counted toward the English degree. Throughout his entire time at Brown, Bachman has pursued a double concentration in economics.
For some students, the flexibility of the Open Curriculum provides them with the freedom to take classes across different disciplines, which has made switching concentrations easier.
“By virtue of their foray into the Open Curriculum,” students “find different pathways of academic interest than they anticipated,” Associate Dean of the College for Class-Year Advising Shaunté Montgomery wrote in an email to The Herald.
Bachman said that “without the Open Curriculum, I’m confident I wouldn’t have been able to make the switch.”
“I don’t feel behind any of my peers,” he added.
After switching her concentration in her junior spring, Noa Brown ’26 also said she “was not extremely far behind.”
Noa Brown initially declared a concentration in science, technology and society and was not considering changing it, she said. But, when she took HIST 1976U: “Planning the Family” — a discussion-based class on the history of contraception — in the fall of her junior year, it quickly became her favorite class and had a “profound impact” on her, she said.
“These were exactly the types of conversations I like to be having,” Noa Brown said. After the class, she realized she wanted to shift her focus to gender and sexuality studies “rather than doing STS” and focusing on “gender and sexuality in medicine.”
She scheduled a meeting with a GNSS concentration advisor after contemplating the switch over winter break. During the meeting, the advisor told her that the concentration requirements are very “flexible,” she said.
After this semester, Noa Brown will only have one course credit to complete for her concentration, she said. But because she entered the concentration later, she is currently taking the concentration's introductory course — GNSS 0120: “Introduction to Gender and Sexuality Studies” — in tandem with her senior seminar.
As a concentrator, she is now more aware of events within the gender and sexuality studies program, including lectures at the Pembroke Center for Teaching and Research on Women, she said.
But some students switch concentrations after discovering new career options.
Alina Watson ’27 came to Brown intending to concentrate in public health and GNSS. Watson was initially considering getting a Master of Public Health at Brown, but after learning about the field of clinical psychology, she realized that a psychology degree would be a better fit.
So, in the middle of her sophomore year, she switched from public health to psychology.
“Psychology is much more niche than public health is,” Watson said. “If I want to become a clinical psychologist, then I have to study psych to get there and do my Ph.D.” Even with a psychology degree, she added, she still has the option to pursue a career in public health.
But Watson said that only two of the credits she earned from her public health classes transferred to her psychology degree. With plans to study abroad and pursue the honors track of the concentration, Watson will have to take five classes for half of her remaining semesters at Brown to finish within four years, she said.
Lukas Kennedy ’26 arrived at Brown intending to double-concentrate in literary arts and computer science-economics. He had initially decided to study computer science because of its applicability to future careers, he said.
But after his sophomore fall, Kennedy reconsidered his double concentration, saying he was “getting repetitively burnt out in CS.” At the time, he was taking CSCI 0330: “Introduction to Computer Systems” and ECON 1130: “Intermediate Microeconomics (Mathematical),” each of which took 30 hours a week, he said.
When he was considering applying for an internship at Google, he realized he didn’t want to be a software engineer, and dropped his computer science-economics concentration.
Because of the work load, Kennedy said he “wasn’t doing anything that was supplementing (him). I stopped running, stopped writing or even hanging out with friends.”
Now, Kennedy said he has more “time to study the things that are important to (him).”
