One of the earliest undergraduate degree programs available to students at what today is Auburn University will return fall semester 2017 when the College of Agriculture begins offering a Bachelor of Science in Agricultural Science. Auburn’s Department of Horticulture will administer the program.
The multidisciplinary major, developed in response to agriculture-related industries’ growing demand for a more broadly skilled workforce, is targeted both toward students interested in a general agriculture degree that will prepare them for a variety of careers in the agricultural industry and toward Auburn Agriscience Education students as a double major.
“We’re excited about the opportunities this Agricultural Science degree will give students in both the College of Agriculture and the College of Education,” said Amy Wright, Auburn agriculture’s associate dean for instruction. “Agriculture students who enroll in the program can tailor their degrees by selecting supporting courses that focus on dimensions of agriculture that interest them most.
“For education students, the State Department of Education requires all teacher preparation programs be completed as a double major with a corresponding science program,” she said. “The Agricultural Science major now provides that option and offers an excellent foundation for anyone working toward a teaching career in ag education.”
The curriculum for Ag Science majors includes courses in horticulture, crop and soil science, animal sciences, agribusiness, fisheries and aquaculture and more.
As early as the 1870s, a bachelor’s degree in Scientific Agriculture was offered to students at the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Alabama, according to the book “Inside Ag Hill: The people and events that shaped Auburn’s agricultural history from 1872 through 1999.” The degree program was discontinued in the 1990s during academic restructuring at Auburn.
Agricultural Science is the second new undergraduate degree program the College of Agriculture will offer effective fall semester. Also debuting is a B.S. program in Applied Biotechnology. The two bring to 12 the number of undergraduate degree programs in the College of Agriculture.
For more information on the Agricultural Science major, email Brian Brown at brownbw@auburn.edu.
The university’s Board of Trustees approved the degree program in June 2016; the Alabama Commission on Higher Education gave it the final OK in March 2017.
