Academic Programs

Accounting majors will learn how to think, problem solve, and critically look at issues. Students receive a unique opportunity to complete a program in accounting within the environment of one of the country's leading liberal arts institutions.

This interdisciplinary program examines the integral role that Africans and people of African descent have played in the histories, politics, cultures and economies all over the world, particularly in Africa, the Americas, the Caribbean and Europe. Using methods from multiple disciplines, students gain insight into our shared past and present.

Anthropology’s distinctive way of studying the world through ethnographic fieldwork provides key insights into how diverse individuals and communities experience gender, race, class and other hierarchies in their daily lives, and how they challenge those hierarchies. Anthropology not only provides a diagnosis for the present, but also offers possible solutions to our pressing human problems.

The rich cultural resources of New England and the greater Northeast form an integral part of our department’s curriculum, offering our students abundant learning, community engagement and internship opportunities.

The practice of art history provides both cognitive and discursive skills to probe past developments and confront those of the present. Through the close study of objects and sites, you'll come to an understanding of the individuals, social contexts and material realities of the past and how this informs the present day.

Led by faculty from disciplines across the curriculum with teaching and research expertise in the Asian region, we offer a major and a minor, and sponsor activities and events beyond the classroom — often in collaboration with other academic departments and divisions. You will have the flexibility to explore your interests through courses in disciplines such as anthropology, economics, history, World Languages, Literatures, and Cultures, music, philosophy, political science, religious studies and theatre.

Biology at Holy Cross has an exceptional tradition. Our graduates pursue a wide range of career options and advanced graduate degrees in various areas of biology and the biomedical sciences. Classes are small and students receive individual attention from faculty members who are dedicated teachers and active scholars.

Catholic Studies offers a rigorous, interdisciplinary approach to Catholic society and culture. You can design your own major or minor across multiple disciplines to pursue a curriculum that suits your interests and passion. Engaging with individual advisors and expert faculty in classics, English, history, World Languages, Literatures, and Cultures, philosophy, religious studies, sociology and visual arts, you can enrich your personal and career goals with the strength of purpose and moral formation that come from Catholic learning.

We strive to instill the fundamentals of critical and independent thinking and to foster intellectual curiosity by actively engaging our students in the scientific method.

The Chinese Studies program offers up to five years of Mandarin Chinese language courses, in addition to courses that explore Chinese literature, cinema and culture through a range of disciplines. Optional practice sessions are offered by Chinese foreign language assistants, who reinforce classroom lessons while simultaneously offering an authentic and contemporary window into Chinese culture.

In our courses, you will learn how to read, analyze and respond to ancient languages and literatures, art and archaeological remains with skill and creativity, and become familiar with several interpretive approaches.

We actively welcome students from a variety of backgrounds and those without any prior experience in computer science. Computer scientists study fundamental questions about knowledge and computation: How to gather, store, transform and learn from information. Computational thinking permeates nearly every modern human endeavor, and computing plays a key role in recent advances in mathematics, natural sciences, economics and many other fields.

Because racial justice is a collective struggle that calls us to be people for and with others, students of all backgrounds are welcome in CRES. Students customize their own curricular plan by choosing a track of courses focused on race and ethnicity from a wide variety of disciplines, including literature, history, sociology, anthropology, classics, religious studies, the arts and other departments at the College. Students gain racial literacy and intercultural sensitivity on a wide variety of topics. They are encouraged to ask their own pressing questions on racial inequality and research topics they are passionate about. CRES encourages students to seek classroom and cocurricular opportunities that provide relevant knowledge and experience for their future careers.

Beyond the classroom, the program offers opportunities for cultural and language immersion through cocurricular activities and community-based learning initiatives.

The economics program at Holy Cross is an integral part of a liberal arts education. Economics majors study within the Department of Economics & Accounting, which has 23 full-time faculty members that are dedicated teachers and scholars who work closely with students to teach them invaluable tools — how to think, problem solve and critically look at issues. Whether students choose to explore the wide variety of topics offered by the major in economics or simply take a few courses to augment other fields of study, they are taught the benefits of understanding the theories of economics and how they can be used to interpret current or historical events.

Through a wide exposure to a range of texts, students are challenged to explore the meaning of literature in a variety of contexts, and by that exploration, develop a deeper understanding of today’s world.

A rich selection of courses will help you explore both our urban and wild surroundings as you investigate sustainability and environmental justice, as well as the relationships between humans and other living things.

Aiming for both breadth and depth, students develop a sophisticated reading of individual movies. It also offers survey and advanced classes in film that offer a variety of approaches: genre, theme, culture, narrative, cinema and history, and the work of individual filmmakers. Classes in (theatrical) direction and photography that both theoretical and hands-on explorations of filmmaking are also offered to students.

The French curriculum is designed to provide you with linguistic proficiency as well as an understanding of French and Francophone literatures and cultures.

Students in the program pursue critical questions from a range of academic disciplines and learn how activism can promote social change.

You will not only learn this widely spoken language, but also study German literature and culture through rich courses and a variety of cultural programs.

The health studies major gives students an opportunity to immerse themselves in an intensive, multi-disciplinary study of health issues. Our multidisciplinary focus prepares students to be better equipped to deal with a host of health issues affecting the world today, most of which are not just biological, but are social, cultural, economic, environmental and political.

Holy Cross is leading the way among undergraduate programs with a curriculum that recognizes the comparative, thematic and transnational nature of history. With a diverse and distinguished faculty, the history department offers a wide range of courses covering much of the world and across time.

The major is inherently interdisciplinary, as it applies historical, political and sociological lenses to analyze global topics and phenomena. You will be challenged to develop critical thinking and writing skills, to master an additional language and to engage important questions of our day from the perspectives of multiple disciplines.

Both in the classroom and beyond, Italian Studies offers rich courses and diverse opportunities for cultural immersion. Whether you declare a major or minor, you will gain a broader understanding of the Italian literary tradition and culture and learn to think and write critically as you master a different language.

Students choose from an array of courses from different departments and examine Latin American and Caribbean peoples and Latinx communities in the United States. The program enables students to become engaged global citizens, who are sensitive to cultural, social, economic and political differences while competent to establish bridges among them.

The mathematics major at Holy Cross reflects a liberal arts perspective of delving beyond the simple understanding of subject matter to understanding why it matters.

The program allows you to design an interdisciplinary major or minor in Medieval and Renaissance Studies, drawing on collegewide offerings in three or more fields. As an era when rival religions competed for minds and hearts, states took form and writers and artists developed vernacular idioms, this period offers a model for contemporary study of the interaction of cultures.

Through a combination of course work and extracurricular activities, this self-designed program allows you to explore the region's culture, history and politics through a multidisciplinary approach. This program emphasizes the integration of various disciplines to provide a comprehensive understanding of the Middle East.

As a universal form of human expression, music transcends boundaries of language, culture, time and place. Whether you are interested in classical, popular or world music, in music of the past or the present, in creating, performing or simply listening, Holy Cross provides a rich context for engagement with music and the arts.

Our program takes a unique, integrative approach to undergraduate neuroscience education. Students are encouraged to develop a broad base of foundational knowledge and skills across STEM disciplines, which is then applied as students acquire a deep understanding of principles, techniques and unanswered questions in neuroscience. The program aims to support and enhance student learning across the sciences, mathematics and philosophy, showing students explicit links between neuroscience and contributing disciplines. Students are thus empowered to develop the critical thinking and problem solving skills needed to confront complex challenges.

At its core, philosophy is the ability to think reflectively and critically about questions at the very foundation of human existence. You will learn how to approach problems imaginatively, explore what might appear to be self-evident and appreciate the ethical implications of decisions and actions.

Physics works to answer the question “why?” — why do objects fall to the ground? Why do we see rainbow colors on the surface of soap bubbles? In learning to answer the question of why, a study of physics at Holy Cross gives students a broad yet detailed knowledge of the physical sciences, provides students with mathematical and analytical skills, trains students in advanced laboratory techniques and teaches students scientific computing methods.

Political science is one of Holy Cross’ most popular majors. The major is rigorously structured so as to ensure breadth as well as depth, with courses required in each of the discipline’s four subfields.

At Holy Cross, the psychology faculty explore the breadth of the discipline with their students both in and beyond the classroom and contribute to the field with their own research.

As an academic institution committed to diversity with a mission to think critically, we offer a range of courses that enable you to understand and appreciate your own particular religious tradition, to situate that tradition in the wider context of other world religions and to discover how diverse religious beliefs and practices are relevant to global concerns.

The interdisciplinary curriculum of Russian and Eastern European Studies will allow you to develop a broader understanding of this culturally rich and politically crucial region from a variety of perspectives. Through courses in history, culture, politics, economics and language, the program offers an opportunity for you to gain background essential to understanding contemporary issues ranging from Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014 and alleged interference in the 2016 U.S. elections, to current German-Russian cooperation in the construction of a Nord Stream Gas Pipeline and the future of the European Union.

The Russian Studies Program courses, major, and minor are designed to be interdisciplinary — combining the study of Russia’s art and culture with its language, history, religious traditions, geography and more.

Analyze structures of power and hierarchy, draw connections between your personal experiences and larger social and historical processes and question preconceived ideas about the nature of society and representation of global cultures.

The Department of Spanish at Holy Cross prepares students to engage with the diverse cultures and communities of Spanish speakers worldwide, including those in the U.S. With faculty expertise spanning literature, film, cultural studies, linguistics, creative writing, digital and medical humanities and decolonial theory, our curriculum promotes critical thinking, creative expression and intellectual growth. We welcome students from all language backgrounds, including native, heritage and second-language learners.

Discover how world narrative traditions transcend cultural and disciplinary boundaries as you explore the relationship between narrative and other areas of study, such as religious studies, history, political science and environmental studies.

Classes are “hands-on,” emphasizing experimenting with materials and acquiring technical and conceptual skills. The department encourages active exhibition of student work through ongoing shows in galleries on campus.

Our teaching and programming has been reviewed and certified as meeting all national standards for formal theatre training.