Majoring & Minoring

At Lewis and Clark, we have built our biology curriculum upon a foundation designed to convey the excitement of biological discovery in three areas that are central to modern biology. Rather than trying to cover the entire realm of biology in a broad, shallow survey, each of these courses delves deeply into its field. In the laboratory for each course, students pose their own questions about living systems and work in teams to design studies to answer those questions. These three core courses are:

• Biology 141 (ecology and environmental science);
• Biology 151 (genetics and evolutionary biology);
• Biology 200 (cellular and molecular biology).

Biology majors also complete at least a year's study of chemistry (two years are recommended) and at least one college-level course in calculus, computer programming, or statistics. Students complete the major by choosing, with the help of their faculty advisers, at least six courses in biology that best serve their individual interests. Most of the upper-division biology courses require student teams to carry out student-designed projects.

Students investigating tidepools on a field trip for Bio 335

For information on Biology department scholarships, please consult the The Kent Swanson, Jr. Biology Scholarship webpage.