Undergraduate Program

Double Majoring in Course XIV

Overview

Students may combine a course 14 major with a major in any other department. In order to receive two majors, students must complete the 17 GIR's and the departmental requirements for both majors. Some double-major combinations are more popular than others. Course 14 double degrees with 6, 18, and 15 are especially popular.

Single and double majors may count three of their economics subjects toward the eight-subject HASS requirement.

Guidelines and Administrative Procedures for Obtaining a Second Major

Students with a cumulative GPA ("Cum") of 4.0 or higher after completing at least two semesters in one major may petition the Committee on Curriculum (CoC) to pursue a second major. The petition must be submitted to the CoC no later than Add Date of the term prior to the term in which the student intends to receive the first of the two degrees. The CoC strictly enforces both the 4.0 minimum Cum and the Add-Date deadline!

Blank forms for second-major petitions, with instructions, are available for downloading and printing from the CoC's web site at: http://web.mit.edu/registrar/forms/index.html.

Double Majoring in XIV and XV

A copy of Undergraduate Program in Management Science, a detailed description of the course XV (Sloan) undergraduate major, is available in E52-391.

The CoC petition form asks for a term-by-term listing of subjects already taken, and a term-by-term plan for taking the remaining subjects, for the curricula in both departments. Here are some guidelines that may be particularly helpful for economics majors:

1. Do not plan to take 14.30 (Introduction to Statistical Method in Economics). The Economics Department will accept the combination of 6.041 (Probabilistic Systems Analysis) and 15.075 (Applied Statistics)-both of which are required for Course 15-in place of 14.30 for double majors. This does NOT work in reverse, i.e., the Sloan School will NOT accept 14.30 (by itself OR in combination with econometrics) as a substitute for either 6.041 or 15.075.

2. Plan to take 15.279 (Management Communication for Undergraduates) during your first spring semester as a double major. The fall term sections of this subject are intended for new sophomores in Course 15, and there often is not enough room for double majors.

3. Plan to take 18.06 (Linear Algebra) as early as possible. Two subjects in the Management Science curriculum (15.053 and 15.075) rely on concepts from 18.06.

4. There are four concentrations on the Management Science curriculum: Finance, Information Technologies, Marketing Science, and Operations Research. When you fill out your petition, you are expected to include specific subjects fulfilling one of these concentrations. (You can change your mind later, if you wish, about the subjects in your concentration-or even about your choice of concentration.)

5. Check the MIT Bulletin course listings to make sure that subjects are offered in the terms in which you plan to take them.

The completed petition should first be signed by the student and by the student's Economics faculty advisor. It should then be submitted to the Management Science Undergraduate Program Office, together with a current "unofficial transcript." Unofficial transcripts can be obtained from the Student Services Center in 11-120 free of charge. (Please note that a WebSIS printout is NOT acceptable in place of an unofficial transcript.) After Course 15 has approved the petition, it should be brought to the Student Services Center in 11-120 or directly to the CoC in Room 5-111. The CoC will inform the student and Sloan Undergraduate Program Office when it has approved the petition.

How the Petition Affects Sloan Bidding:
All MIT students are required to "bid," as part of pre-registration, for any Sloan subjects they want to take the following term. The bidding process is a prioritized lottery. As soon as Course 15 is notified by the CoC of an approved petition to pursue Management Science as a second SB degree, a student will be considered a "Sloan student" for purposes of bidding priorities. In order to ensure sufficient time to process petitions prior to bidding, students must submit signed, approvable petitions to the Management Science Undergraduate Program Office on or before Drop Date of the first term in which they wish to bid as Sloan students. This is an absolute deadline. It will not be possible for any student who misses the deadline to be considered a Sloan student during the bidding for subjects to be taken the following term. (If you bring us your petition just before the deadline, and if we approve it, we will deliver the petition directly to the CoC for you.)

HOWEVER-
Sloan Bidding Priority is UNNECESSARY for half of the Sloan Curriculum!
Some students who are primarily interested in Economics, but who also want to pursue a second major in Management Science, believe they should declare Course 15 first in order to obtain the bidding priority of a Sloan student as early as possible. This is unnecessary and could result in inadequate advising regarding the Economics curriculum. Five of the 14 subjects required in Course 15 are offered by other departments, and require no bidding. (These are 14.01 and 14.02, which are also part of the Economics curriculum, as well as 6.041, 18.06, and either 1.00 or 6.001.) In addition, two of Sloan's required subjects (15.301 and 15.501) have almost always accommodated all of the students who have bid for them, including students from other MIT departments.