For students in India, opting for the humanities or commerce streams in junior college (+2) after class X means an irreversible move away from core sciences – Physics, Chemistry and Biology. While students in the science stream in +2 can switch to arts or even commerce for undergrad studies, the choices for those in non-science stream remain limited to BA (any subject) or BCom or, in some institutions, BSc in areas such as nutrition and fashion design. A BSc in a core science domain is shut for non-science students at the +2 level. Result: a significant number of students prefer sciences in +2; often not for any love for sciences but for a strategic reason: to keep their options open in undergrad studies.
Well, this has now begun to change. An increasing number of universities and institutions of repute allow students to major in sciences in undergrad studies irrespective of what they studied earlier.
For example, consider the Bengaluru-based Azim Premji University. It invites applications from anyone who secures at least 50% in any stream in class XII. The applicant must clear a national-level entrance test and go through an interview. If selected, (s)he can opt to major in Biology or Physics, the two science domains the university offers at undergrad level.
Rigorous process
Ashoka, another new age university, located at Sonepat in Haryana, also allows students to major in sciences irrespective of what they chose to study earlier; of course, after a rigorous selection process. Ashoka offers an additional advantage: a student needs to declare what (s)he wants to major in, only at the end of the third semester. This offers scope for students to dabble in a few areas of interest before deciding to focus on one of them.
Krea, a university that is being set up at Sri City north of Chennai, will kick off its undergrad academic programmes in 2019. Backed by luminaries such as former RBI governor Raghuram Rajan and former chairman of ICICI Bank Narayanan Vaghul, Krea will offer a BSc (Honours) programme in Life Sciences & Cognitive Sciences, Environmental Studies and Physical Sciences to students from any stream. After sifting applicants through a multi-stage selection process, Krea will allow those selected to choose any major after the second year of the 4-year programme.
Sure, one could argue that undergrad programmes in these private sector institutions are relatively more expensive and hence out of reach for most students. However, all of them offer need-based scholarships to make sure that no student drops out because of financial constraints. There is one non-negotiable condition though: their undergrad programmes are compulsorily residential.
Distance mode
What if someone is unable to relocate to pursue sciences in undergrad? Well, there are inexpensive options such as the distance education programme offered by the state-run Mahatma Gandhi University in Meghalaya. The university offers a 3-year course titled ‘Bachelor of Science in General’. Anyone who has cleared the class XII exam in any stream from any board is eligible to enrol. The syllabus includes Physics, Chemistry, Biology as well as Mathematics, thus potentially offering solid grounding across disciplines. Tuition fee: only R .15,000 per semester.
The prognosis is clear: more universities will open their doors to students from the arts and commerce streams for undergrad courses in pure sciences. You need not feel pressured to choose sciences after class X only ‘to keep choices open’. Conversely, the disadvantage that students of non-science disciplines have been facing at the +2 level, in terms of choices in higher education, has just begun to diminish.
The author is a core team member of ThinQ - www.schoolofthinQ.com . He can be reached at
