Bachelor of Arts in Honours Arts - Sexuality, Marriage and Family Studies

at University of Waterloo Canada

Behind just about every advance in information, power, and energy, you’ll find an electrical engineer. Join the ranks of those innovators with a degree from Waterloo, whose electrical engineering program is ranked in the top 75 internationally (Shanghai World University Rankings 2020).

You’ll study the fundamentals of electromagnetism, circuits, algorithms, and instrumentation. You'll also gain hands-on experience starting right in first year, thanks to paid co-op work terms and some of the best electrical engineering student labs in North America.

When you graduate, you’ll have hundreds of career paths open to you: from designing power stations and aircraft control systems to pioneering the future of microprocessors and telecommunications systems.

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 the Master of Business, Entrepreneurship and Technology (MBET), students learn inside and outside of the classroom. Networking, practical experience, and hands-on learning with like-minded people in the Waterloo entrepreneurship community that complement the core master's-level courses inside the classroom.

Students are immersed in an experiential learning environment. Through the program, students are focused on the commercialization of their ideas to build a venture. Students will also explore creating new ventures within an existing organization in a corporate innovation project, and will also collaborate with early-stage technology startups to validate their business model. 

Combinatorics looks at permutations and combinations. Optimization explores ways to make any operation work more efficiently within given constraints. Together, they provide powerful methods for modelling and solving large management problems, from optimizing flight schedules to making a factory’s layout as efficient as possible.

In Combinatorics and Optimization at Waterloo, you’ll learn concepts such as enumeration, combinatorical designs, graph theory, linear programming, nonlinear optimization, operations research, and combinatorical optimization, and how to use them in real-world applications. Plus, you'll have the opportunity to gain paid work experience through the co-op program.

When you graduate, you can put your skills to work in areas as diverse as cryptography, electronic security, software development, social media, and risk analysis.

From civil unrest in the Middle East to international trade negotiations, today’s political landscape is complex. Learn how to navigate (and shape) that terrain with a Political Science degree from Waterloo.

Investigate a wide range of topics, or dive deep with a specialization in Canadian Politics, Global Governance, International Relations, or Politics and Business.

Either way, you’ll hone your analytical, writing, critical thinking, and research skills in a mix of lectures, seminars, and workshops. You’ll also get an insiders’ perspective, studying with top scholars involved in current international policy debates. Gain an understanding of comparative politics, international relations, social sciences, and political theory. If you want to apply your teachings early, you can choose the co-op stream and get some work experience while going through your degree.

If you enjoy biology and physics and want a career in medical technology or health research, Life Physics at Waterloo is for you.
Run by the Department of Physics and Astronomy — one of the largest and most innovative physics departments in Canada — this flexible and interdisciplinary program is based on a solid foundation of physics, chemistry, and biology.

You’ll enjoy small classes, hands-on labs, and the opportunity to get involved in research and teaching.

Specializations

• Medical Physics: Prepare for a career in medical physics, working in areas such as cancer diagnosis and treatment, or in diagnostic imaging.
• Biophysics: Learn about cellular and organ biophysics, as well as biophotonics and imaging. Graduate with a strong foundation in subjects such as quantum physics and molecular biology.

Learn to tackle issues of economic inequality, social injustice, and environmental change. Build capacity to solve problems at the local level. We’ll give you lots of tools to put in your toolkit, including business skills, problem solving, cultural understanding, economic development, social accounting, and more.

Meanwhile, adding some environmental studies, social sciences, and language courses will strengthen your adaptability and thinking skills. You’ll graduate knowing how to design development projects that are ethical, environmentally sustainable, culturally responsible, and scientifically accountable.

Discover how to manipulate individual atoms and molecules in Materials and Nanosciences at Waterloo. As one of the top two nanoscience programs in Canada (Academic World Ranking of Universities 2020), this program has lots to offer, including co-op opportunities. You’ll learn the ins and outs of designing composite materials, ceramics, semiconductor materials, fuel cells, energy storage devices, solar cells, and more. And thanks to small classes, you’ll have plenty of opportunity to connect with other students and professors.

Materials and Nanoscience is a mix of chemistry, physics, and math. You’ll also take materials science courses where you learn about what makes a substance unique. For example, if you arrange atoms in a certain way, why does the material have stability and strength rather than flexibility? In upper years, you can choose to take more chemistry or physics. It all depends on what aspects of materials science you enjoy.

You’ll graduate ready for a career at the forefront of innovation, helping create environmentally friendly, efficient, and cost-effective solutions in fields ranging from aerospace to biomedicine.

In one of North America’s top schools of architecture, you’ll get a broad education that covers everything from building materials and construction techniques to cultural history, social context, green architecture, and more. Not to mention you can combine it all with co-op.

However, the core of pre-professional program is design courses, starting right in year one. You’ll get your own dedicated space in our studio where you’ll develop your ideas and skills through a series of hands-on projects.

Learn about society and culture, the principles of physics, materials and techniques of construction, human interaction with the natural and built environment, critical thought, and the diverse forms of creative expression.

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!

Get ready to wrestle with important and complex questions: How do you turn a poor country into a rich country? How can we avoid another global financial crisis? What’s the best way for governments to stimulate new industries like biotechnology and green energy?

In first year, you’ll cover the fundamentals of micro-and macro-economics. In upper years, you can analyze how those principles play out in a wide range of sectors, including public policy, labour economics, health economics, finance, sport, and more.

Whether you’re aiming to work in the public sector, the private sector, or academia, your Economics degree from Waterloo will give you the skills and knowledge you need, along with co-op experience to back you up.

One of the joys of being in university is having time to broaden your horizons, discover new interests, and get involved in a range of extracurricular activities. Liberal Studies gives you that freedom.

Commonly called a liberal arts degree at other universities, Liberal Studies allows you to explore many different subjects in the humanities, social sciences, languages and cultures, and fine and performing arts – plus courses you’d like to take from some of Waterloo's other faculties.

You can add focus to your degree with a minor or minors, or keep it completely general. (And if you do fall passionately in love with a subject along the way, you can switch into a major at any point.) An academic advisor can help you plan your degree and choose courses.