Bachelor of Arts in Honours Arts and Business - English - Literature and Rhetoric

at University of Waterloo Canada

Explore how human interactions are influenced by individual, collective, and structural forces such as mental health, social relationships, economic conditions, education and politics, and movements for social justice and social change. The common goal of those who study Social Development Studies is to help people, communities, and nations flourish.

Through courses in areas such as psychology, sociology, and social work as well as hands-on community engagement opportunities, you’ll be well prepared for a meaningful career in social work, counselling, education, public services, human resources, law, or community and international service organizations. You can also enhance your learning experience by enrolling in co-op and applying what you learn in class to real work situations.

What is co-op?
Co-op lets you explore careers and gain paid work experience while earning your university degree. What could be better than that?! As a co-op student at Waterloo, you’ll normally alternate between four months in school and four months as a full-time employee of the organization you're working for. It's an amazing way to learn to successfully interview for jobs, see how your degree relates to real-life problems, graduate with up to two years of valuable experience – and make money!

Explore how people shape the planet we live on. Delve into the dynamics of the Earth’s physical systems. Help solve many of the world’s most pressing problems, such as climate change, water scarcity, resource management, global population growth, natural resource sustainability, and more.

Waterloo's Geography and Environmental Management department is one of Canada's largest and is ranked 39 in the world for research and reputation (QS Subject Rankings 2019, Shanghai World Rankings 2020). Choose from more than 70 geography courses, including lots of field studies, and maybe even take the opportunity to gain paid work experience through co-op.

Geography offers the flexibility to focus your degree with a variety of specializations and options or even add another major.

You’ll quickly connect with other students in the Faculty of Environment’s welcoming and close-knit community. And when you graduate, your degree can take you literally anywhere around the globe.

Learn to engineer the products we use every day. Turn fuel into energy, waste into resources, and raw material into finished products in one of the largest chemical engineering departments in Canada, and one of the top 100 in the world.

You’ll develop expertise in chemistry and materials science — plus you’ll learn the systems analysis skills to design, implement, and manage processes from start to finish.

You’ll put that knowledge to work during your six co-op terms: creating an impressive résumé, exploring different career areas, and earning money to help pay for your education.

What is co-op?
Co-op lets you explore careers and gain paid work experience while earning your university degree. What could be better than that?! As a co-op student at Waterloo, you’ll normally alternate between four months in school and four months as a full-time employee of the organization you're working for. It's an amazing way to learn to successfully interview for jobs, see how your degree relates to real-life problems, graduate with up to two years of valuable experience – and make money!

How will the stock market perform next February? How much will insurance companies pay out in claims next year? With an Actuarial Science degree from Waterloo, you’ll have the answers.

In this program, you'll take courses such as the mathematics of finance, risk theory, and pension mathematics taught by professional actuaries in one of North America’s top actuarial schools.

Meanwhile, adding computer science, arts, and various math electives will give you the combination of technical and communication skills that employers are looking for.

Whether you choose the regular stream or the co-op stream, you'll graduate ready to enter a great job market with great prospects and high starting salaries.

What is co-op?
Co-op lets you explore careers and gain paid work experience while earning your university degree. What could be better than that?! As a co-op student at Waterloo, you’ll normally alternate between four months in school and four months as a full-time employee of the organization you're working for. It's an amazing way to learn to successfully interview for jobs, see how your degree relates to real-life problems, graduate with up to two years of valuable experience – and make money!

In this exciting, highly interactive program (formerly Speech Communication), you’ll explore how our everyday forms of communication create meaning and shape our perspective of the world. This degree is unique within Canada for our experience-based study of verbal, non-verbal, visual, and digital communication practices.

You’ll learn to master interviewing skills, become adept at public speaking, and communicate effectively as a leader. You'll also study the dynamics of communication in your personal interactions, your classrooms, workspaces, in your use of online and digital spaces, and more broadly in media and public communication.

Over the course of your degree, you’ll hone your written and oral communication skills while developing expertise in teamwork, research, visual and digital literacy, and critical analysis — just the kind of skills that employers are hungry for. Enrolling in the co-op stream will provide insights into possible careers and paid work experience along the way.

What is co-op?
Co-op lets you explore careers and gain paid work experience while earning your university degree. What could be better than that?! As a co-op student at Waterloo, you’ll normally alternate between four months in school and four months as a full-time employee of the organization you're working for. It's an amazing way to learn to successfully interview for jobs, see how your degree relates to real-life problems, graduate with up to two years of valuable experience – and make money!

From the ATM down the street to the drone that will one day deliver your pizza, computer-controlled electromechanical systems drive all kinds of technology. Learn to design those systems in Waterloo’s Mechatronics Engineering program — the first of its kind in Canada and one of the top 100 in the world (Shanghai World University Rankings 2020).

You’ll develop expertise in mechanical engineering, electronics, control engineering, and computer science, pulling together know-how from these different fields to develop sophisticated machines.

During your co-op terms, you’ll have the chance to try out different career paths, earn money to pay for your education, and build a résumé guaranteed to impress potential employers.

What is co-op?
Co-op lets you explore careers and gain paid work experience while earning your university degree. What could be better than that?! As a co-op student at Waterloo, you’ll normally alternate between four months in school and four months as a full-time employee of the organization you're working for. It's an amazing way to learn to successfully interview for jobs, see how your degree relates to real-life problems, graduate with up to two years of valuable experience – and make money!

In Mathematical Physics, you’ll combine theoretical physics with high-level math courses in differential equations, vector calculus, and applied mathematics. You’ll also get plenty of chances to apply that learning with hands-on labs in mechanics, electricity and magnetism, computer programming, optics, and more.

You won’t find a better place to study than Waterloo. Our Faculty of Mathematics is the largest in Canada. Meanwhile, the Department of Physics is one of Canada’s largest and most innovative, and this program comes with a co-op option so students can gain up to two years of paid work experience while pursuing their degree.

What is co-op?
Co-op lets you explore careers and gain paid work experience while earning your university degree. What could be better than that?! As a co-op student at Waterloo, you’ll normally alternate between four months in school and four months as a full-time employee of the organization you're working for. It's an amazing way to learn to successfully interview for jobs, see how your degree relates to real-life problems, graduate with up to two years of valuable experience – and make money!

Love the written word? An English degree at Waterloo gives you all kinds of opportunity to explore that passion, with more than 150 undergraduate courses available in both the regular and co-op streams.

Take rhetoric courses and learn the art of persuasion. Focus on digital media, where you’ll merge the latest technology with enduring principles of effective communication. Or explore the pleasures and insights of English literature, from Beowulf to Virginia Woolf.

At Waterloo, you’ll be learning from the best: the Department of English features internationally recognized scholars. In their classes, you’ll develop all-important skills in communication, critical thinking, analysis, and persuasion.

At the end of first year, you can choose one of three majors within the English program.

• Literature
• Literature and Rhetoric
• Rhetoric, Media, and Professional Communication

Literature and Rhetoric
The Literature and Rhetoric degree brings together the dual strengths of the UWaterloo Department of English. It provides a structured course of study to train you in both disciplines and considerable freedom in exploring your own interests. 

In studying literature and literary theory, you will be grounded in the traditions of British, Canadian, American, and Postcolonial literatures. In studying Rhetoric and Professional Writing, you will explore the history and theory of rhetoric, the nature of professional writing and information design, and digital media.

What is co-op?
Co-op lets you explore careers and gain paid work experience while earning your university degree. What could be better than that?! As a co-op student at Waterloo, you’ll normally alternate between four months in school and four months as a full-time employee of the organization you're working for. It's an amazing way to learn to successfully interview for jobs, see how your degree relates to real-life problems, graduate with up to two years of valuable experience – and make money!

With so many different sciences to love, why limit yourself? Honours Science at Waterloo lets you keep your interests broad.

Take a range of courses in chemistry, biology, physics, earth sciences, and more in the most flexible program within the Faculty of Science. Because you don’t have to commit to a specific discipline, more than half of your courses are electives. Choose additional science courses, or take advantage of offerings from other faculties or departments across the university.

Once you graduate, an Honours Science degree gives you an excellent foundation for many science-related careers. It also makes it easy to meet the requirements for professional programs such as medicine, dentistry, optometry, and more.

The Honours Visual Culture academic plan focuses on the important role visual culture plays within culture and society. The academic plan is intended to be truly interdisciplinary with a focus on the history and theory of visual culture while recognizing the rapidly growing international contexts and vastly diverse cultures of spectatorship. The plan consists of a spine of five courses in visual culture, beginning with introductory courses that situate art and film within the wider context of visuality (i.e. how we see the world), followed by courses that address visual culture from a variety of disciplines and within diverse theoretical models, and culminates in an independent tutorial-style course in which students prepare a final-year thesis under the supervision of a faculty member. These courses are supplemented by at least 11 other courses that concentrate on different aspects of visual culture, chosen from more than one hundred possibilities taught in over 20 different departments and units across the university.

Students enrolled in the Honours Fine Arts – Visual Culture academic plan may wish to enhance their plan by taking a second upper-level course (VCULT 401) in their final year that is a continuation of the final-year thesis.