Neuroscience Personal Statement

My previous self-statement for New College proposed a Neuroscience major with added components of behavior and psychology; however, my studies ended up taking me more in the direction of behavior and theory than planned. I still feel as though a proficient understanding in neurobiology was necessary and helpful in understanding and participating in my upper-level, non-biology courses. I used the basic major requirement for a Neuroscience/ Behavioral Biology degree at nearby institutions such as Emory and Georgia State University to guide my own degree path. Basic pre-requisites in the sciences are available at Alabama, as well as a wide variety of elective courses dealing with my depth-study, including Neuroethics, Neuroanthropology, and special topics in things like desire, attraction, psychadelics and ASC. Core courses include an introductory neurobiology course, a behavioral neuroscience course, a cognitive neuroscience course, and a laboratory. I used various departments to supplement these courses, …show more content…
Every semester, at the start of registration, I contact other students in the New college with depth studies similar to mine in order to survey the courses they have taken so far. So far, it has only amounted to a spread sheet of relative courses from various departments that I use to guide my course selections, but with the growing number of students interested in Neuroscience, not only in New college, but also surrounding departments, I feel that it could be of more use. I often have other students who, after asking my major, say things like, “I wanted to major in Neuroscience, but the University didn’t offer it,” or “I would have done that had I known about New College.” The interest is there, but students are put off either by the fact that Neuroscience isn’t an official major or by the extra work that is required for New college students to develop their course