Individual Course of Study
All students interested in pursuing the Individualized Course of Study within the BS in HCDE program should contact the academic advisor.
Please review the BS in HCDE Individualized course of study form (PDF).
The Individualized Course of Study allows students to create a specialization within HCDE that is specific to their academic and professional interests.
In addition to creating a specialization, students interested in pursuing a dual degree often choose this option, with their required coursework from their second degree counting as their specialized coursework. The university requires 225 credits for dual degrees.
Students complete the Individualized option based on the following requirements:
- Takes two of the HCDE courses listed below (6–9 credits).
- Takes 17 to 21 additional approved elective credits. Must demonstrate a coherent and relevant area of specialization.
Additional HCDE Courses
- HCDE 401* Style and Editing in Scientific and Technical Writing (5)
- HCDE 407 Software User Assistance (5)
- HCDE 419 Concepts in Human-Computer Interaction (5)
- HCDE 455 User Interface Design (5)
Course descriptions are available on the Courses page.
*HCDE 401 has a co-requisite of Linguistics 100 or English 371
Students are strongly advised to develop a coherent and relevant area of specialization and propose the 27 upper-division elective credits that relate to this area. For example, this specialization could be within computer science, in which case the student would construct a program of 300- and 400-level computer science related electives.
Possible Areas of Specialization
- Human factors or usability; Human-Computer Interaction (HCI)
- The psychology of technical communication
- Instructional design
- Science writing
- An engineering discipline
- A natural science
- Computer science
A partial list of courses students have taken previously to fulfill their Approved Electives is available; be sure to consult your advisor when planning your degree requirements.
