As an undergraduate course of study, neuroscience provides students with an incredibly broad range of career options. It is, first and foremost, an ideal course of study for students who wish to pursue graduate studies in neuroscience itself, as well as those who wish to enter Medical School - especially with an eye towards psychiatric care. Similarly, it provides a firm grounding for students who wish to move into counseling, therapy, addiction work or social work, therefore serving as a good option for students who want to pursue some amount of graduate work, but for one reason or another find Medical School or PhD programs a poor fit.
But even without further study, students with a bachelor’s degree in neuroscience are well suited to take on roles as laboratory technicians, health educators, and technical writers: all jobs that offer a salary well above the national median and are experiencing job growth anywhere between 5% and 7% faster than the national average, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Outlook Handbook.
This breadth of options makes neuroscience an ideal course of study for students who know they want to pursue the sciences, but have yet to fully understand where their talents might lead them.
Our Neuroscience curriculum was built with support of four key members of the National Neuroscience Curriculum Initiative. The NNCI is a collaboration between educators and neuroscientists that seeks to make core concepts in neuroscience available to a broader audience. To accomplish this, they have developed engaging and interactive exercises for teaching in the classroom through a peer-review process. Their overarching aim is to create, pilot, and disseminate a comprehensive set of shared resources in the field of neuroscience.
Thanks to the help of our academic contributors, we have been able to layer a significant amount of NNCI content into a more traditional undergraduate neuroscience curriculum, providing students with a much deeper understanding of the brain. This is especially true of the fourth neuroscience course, Clinical Neuropathology, which is based heavily on the NNCI Quarantine Curriculum, adapted to an undergraduate audience.
As is typical for neuroscience, this program places a strong emphasis on biology and psychology coursework in addition to focused neuroscience courses. This program covers some - but not all - premedical requirements. Students who wish to go to medical school must also take one year of physics, one year of organic chemistry, calculus, and select Biochemistry I as one of their electives, for a total of 20 additional credit hours.
The curriculum committee is pleased with course development and student feedback in the Neuroscience curriculum. The implementation of a CURE (Course-Based Undergraduate Research experience) gives students the opportunity to develop original research projects in Neuroscience.
| Member | Organization | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Heather Rissler | University of Kansas Medical Center | Academic representative |
| Shelli Carter | American Public University System | Academic representative |
| Jon Drucker | Aptima, Inc. | Industry representative |
| Teresa Wen | Johnson & Johnson | Industry representative |
| Andrew Savage | Tiffin University | Academic representative |
Recommended CIP Code: 26.1501
Note: Courses provided through the LCMC are shown in blue text