Student Recruitment tell me that the large majority of students discussing minors with them do so because the list of subjects they wish to study is too long to do them all as majors (depending on the subject even two might be too many!). The discussions is then to encourage the student to identify the subject(s) they want to study more of and those they can live with less of or view as a bonus/added extra.
A few other important messages I learnt from them:
- Others may have heard about creative writing and badly want to study it, without realising that it is only a minor (and entry is restricted based on the submission of written work).
- Some students end up with (or close to) a minor without even knowing it, just by selecting related courses for their electives
- Planning for a minor should start early on, as at least one 300 level course is required. Either that or building on 100 electives to get through in three years.
The rules
Whether or not we include minors in our programme pages it is worth noting the rules:
- Only some degrees allow minors, being BA, BCom, BDI, BSc, and BTM.
- At least 60 points at 200 level or above
- At least 15 points at 300 level
- No 300 course can count for two majors
- Can't have a major and a minor in the same subject in the same degree.
- Minors of participating degrees (see above) may be drawn from all majors in the BA, BCom, BAS, BDI, BSc, aplus additional minors specified for the BA, BCom, BDI and BSc
Subject availability by level
Our current plan is to indicate the level (loosely used to also refer to quantum of courses/points) that a subject is available by the use of tags, with the two main ones being UG and PG and two less common being Pre-degree and Professional degree. We were using Minor only but have removed this based on feedback and labeld these as UG. However they are labelled there are a few questions to answer for these subjects:
- Do we say something different for minor only? If so what?
- Do we link through to the degree page? If so how to we handle that no major has yet been chosen?
In thinking about this I became aware that subjects are available at different levels and at different combinations of levels. The following table attempts to summarise this for the purposes of making decisions on how to handle the content and navigation/flow. Although this started off to cover minors it has widened slightly to cover the other unusual subject-level mappings that will need handling.
| Level(s) | Number of applicable subjects | Subjects | Comments | Decision | Draft text | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sub-minor | 2 | Text Technologies Writing (Academic and Professional) | Not quite sure how these two "few course" subjects got listed when others didn't. Will this set a precident?
| Treat in content | There are a small number of courses available in (Subject name), so you will need to choose another subject as the main focus of your degree. The courses in (Subject Name) are: |
| 2 | Minor | 2 | Econometrics Science in Context | |||
| 3 | Minor, Pre-degree | 1 | New Zealand Sign Language | |||
| 4 | Minor, UG, PG | 4 | Development Studies * Environmental Science * Environmental Studies * Tourism Management ^ | |||
| 5 | Minor, PG | 2 | Creative Writing Social Policy | |||
| 6 | Pre-degree | 1 | English Proficiency Programme | |||
| 7 | Pre-degree, UG, PG | 1 | Maori Studies | |||
| 8 | Professional degree, UG, PG | 1 | Management (Studies) | |||
| 9 | Total | 14 |
*Listed as a minor in the BSc (with requirements more specific than those for any minor) and as a major in the same degree
^Listed as a minor in the BCom, but also available in a BTM