Undergraduate Academic Accelerator Pathway (2-Term) - Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Studies

at Shorelight Group - University of South Carolina USA

It takes a lot of expertise to analyze, plan, design and build our modern world. With a master’s degree in civil engineering, you’ll be prepared to work with a range of clients and collaborators, from government agencies to private firms.

Areas of study include:

• Environmental engineering
• Geotechnical engineering
• Structural engineering
• Transportation engineering
• Water resources engineering

If you are interested in research, the University of South Carolina has several research centers and groups available to you, including the Structural Dynamics and Intelligent Infrastructure laboratory, the Berge laboratory for green waste management and the Advanced Railroad Technology Group.

Do you want to write beautiful stories, expose wrongdoing and master the digital world through print media? Or perhaps instead, you see yourself delivering information through radio or television broadcasting. No matter the medium, your job is to find the truth and tell compelling stories that make a difference down the street and across the world.

Turn on any major network news channel and you'll see our graduates at work. ESPN, CNN, FOX, NBC, BET, CBS, ABC — it's an alphabet soup that spells out success. Flip on the television in New York, Philadelphia, Hong Kong, Charlotte, Atlanta, Amsterdam, Denver, Tampa and other major cities — we're there, too. You'll also be part of a powerful network that includes colleagues at National Geographic, the Harlem Globetrotters, NFL films and almost every television station in the Southeast. Here are just a few of our alumni making their mark in the field.

The B.A. in Environmental Studies degree incorporates critical social, economic, policy, communications and/or humanities components that are not within the B.S. degree. The curriculum prepares students to address complex environmental problems requiring knowledge and understanding from multiple social and science disciplines that are framed in an environmental context. Students learn to make sound analyses and judgments about interdisciplinary environmental challenges and to seek and develop sustainable solutions that productively integrate social and economic needs with scientific and technical understanding.

Environmental Studies majors may combine coursework in sustainability, anthropology, political science, geography, history, economics, business, media arts and journalism to create an individually tailored curriculum relative to their career goals.

Impending environmental challenges include climate change, increasing drought and other extreme weather events and their impacts on infrastructure and food, energy and water supply, loss of biodiversity, increases in infectious disease, and invasive species. Environmental scientists may find themselves conducting field research to quantify such issues, while environmental studies majors may use their skills to incorporate that data into policy, advocacy and sustainable business practices.

As a physics major, you will be exposed to challenging coursework that will give you a solid foundation in all of the central areas of physics, including Newtonian mechanics, electricity and magnetism, statistical physics and quantum mechanics. You will also have the opportunity to tailor the program to your own interests by choosing from specialized experimental courses or designing your own research program in consultation with our faculty researchers.

As a physics major, you will be exposed to challenging coursework that will give you a solid foundation in all of the central areas of physics, including Newtonian mechanics, electricity and magnetism, statistical physics and quantum mechanics. You will also have the opportunity to tailor the program to your own interests by choosing from specialized experimental courses or designing your own research program in consultation with our faculty researchers.

We have the largest history department in South Carolina, offering the most comprehensive course of study in the state and one of the most competitive in the region and nation.

As a history major, through in-depth analysis of the evolution of social, economics, cultural-intellectual and political patterns and events, you’ll develop an understanding of and appreciation for the life and development of various cultures, institutions and civilizations. You will become an expert at answering the questions “Who are we, and how did we get here?” You will learn how to situate yourself in the long continuum of human experience and how to find meaning in the past.

The skills you develop as a history major will give you the capacity to make the voices, stories and events of the past come alive and to give shape to the experiences and processes that have defined the interaction of humans with each other and with the world around them.

A selected number of history majors or minors spend their junior or senior year (or a spring or fall semester) at the University of Warwick, Coventry, England, while maintaining their normal progress toward graduation. Warwick has the United Kingdom’s second-highest-ranked history department.

Whether you want to explore issues facing the public officials who caucus in buildings just blocks from campus or master international relations, political science students receive broad exposure to the discipline while gaining an understanding about how politics, government and governance shape the world and its quality of citizenship.  

As a political science major, you will be selecting courses from fields such as American politics, comparative politics, international relations, public administration and policy, and political theory while also developing one or two individualized areas of interest.

You will learn how to research the answers to important questions related to politics, political values and public policy. You will benefit from a wide variety of course offerings and have the opportunity to complete a public service internship to gain hands-on experience.

It takes a lot of expertise to analyze, plan, design and build our modern world. With a master’s degree in civil engineering, you’ll be prepared to work with a range of clients and collaborators, from government agencies to private firms.

Areas of study include:

• Environmental engineering
• Geotechnical engineering
• Structural engineering
• Transportation engineering
• Water resources engineering

If you are interested in research, the University of South Carolina has several research centers and groups available to you, including the Structural Dynamics and Intelligent Infrastructure laboratory, the Berge laboratory for green waste management and the Advanced Railroad Technology Group.

A department in the College of Arts and Sciences, the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry focuses on training professional chemists and providing a base degree for advanced study in medicine, pharmacy and other professional schools. The department places an emphasis on undergraduate research and has outstanding faculty members.

The following courses fulfill some of the requirements for a bachelor's degree with a major in biochemistry and molecular biology:

• General Chemistry I and II
• Organic Chemistry I and II
• Principal Chemistry
• Physical Biochemistry
• Biological Principles
• Bacteriology
• Cell and Molecular Biology
• Fundamental Genetics

By building expertise in solid mechanics, materials processes, smart materials, manufacturing automation, concurrent engineering/design, sustainable design or thermofluid/energy sciences, students stand prepared to join the mechanical engineering and manufacturing industries in South Carolina and beyond.

As a mechanical engineering major, you will have the opportunity to work with a professor in research on some of today’s most notable engineering challenges. You will develop skills that will give you the ability to solve many of today’s world problems. Mechanical engineering majors will choose a concentration from design and manufacturing, engineering materials, mechanics of solids, thermal and fluid systems, and nuclear engineering.

The studio art program offers two Bachelor degree options. As a studio art major, you will benefit from outstanding facilities and hands-on experience through internship and research opportunities.

    The B.A. in Studio Art is a general degree that allows students to explore many different mediums and, at 39 credit hours, is well suited for students who are interested in double majoring.

All B.F.A. undergraduate students will:

• Define and explain development of art, within their own and other cultures, from prehistory to the present.
• Critically analyze aspects of the design and art-making process and evaluate theories, philosophies and research in the practice of the studio arts.
• Through their artwork, demonstrate their competency of aesthetic literacy.
• Synthesize their learning from the curriculum into a final culminating experience within their chosen concentration.
• Have a solo exhibition of their creative research to be examined by the student’s major faculty.