The Long Road to My Degree

The Goal: Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) 4-Year Honours – English Major, Psychology and Religion Minors.

A Bit of Terminology/Explanation:
A course which takes 3 months or 1 term to complete = 3 credit hours.
100 level = 1st year class
200 level = 2nd year class The higher the level,
300 level = 3rd year class the more difficult the course.
400 level = 4th year class

The total requirement for a B.A. 4-Year Honours is 120 credit hours.

To get any B.A. at Brandon University you must have 6 credit hours in each of three specified course areas:
Humanities (ex. English, History, French, Music, Philosophy, Religion);
Social Sciences (ex. Business Administration, Economics, Native Studies, Political Science, Psychology, Sociology);
and Natural Sciences (ex. Botany, Chemistry, Physics, Geology, Mathematics, Zoology).

English Major 4-Year Honors requires:
a minimum of 48 credit hours with only 6 of those at the 100 Level and at least 27 at the 300/400 Level, plus only 6 of the 48 credit hours can be from Creative Writing.
And just in case that isn’t enough…let me explain the Historical Breadth Requirement:
I have to take a minimum of 18 credit hours from the following list of courses:
Greek Poetry in Translation Victorian Poetry
Greek Drama in Translation Victorian Prose
Latin Literature in Translation Medieval Drama
Women Writers I Old English Literature
Chaucer and his Contemporaries Literature of the Sixteenth Century
Shakespeare Milton
Literature of the Seventeenth Century Beowulf
Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Literature History of Literary Criticism
Romantic Literature Contemporary Critical Theory
Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Comedy Middle English Romance
If you can believe it, this is actually one of the easier degrees in terms of meeting the requirements.

4-Year Minor in Psychology requires:
credit in 82:160 (Introduction to Psychology) and 82:161 (General Psychology) plus a minimum of 12 additional credit hours in Psychology.

4-Year Minor in Religion requires:
a minimum of 18 credit hours in Religion.

How Close I Am:
The Facts:
Since I am majoring in English and minoring Psychology, I have already met the general B.A. requirement of 6 credit hours in the area of both Humanities and Social Sciences.
I have completed a total of 9 of 48 credit hours in English (including 6 at the 100 Level – meaning I must take only 200 Level and up until I am finished). I have no credit hours as of yet for the Historical Breadth Requirement.
I have completed 6 of 18 credit hours in Psychology (including 82:160 and 82:161 – the required classes – meaning now I can take whatever I want).
I have completed 6 or 18 credit hours in Religion.
I have 30 transfer credits from Assiniboine Community College in the area of Business Administration (basically this does nothing other than fill electives for me, but that’s ok, every little bit helps!).
The Conclusion:
In total I have completed 51 credit hours of the required 120, meaning I need 69 more credit hours. I need 39 more credit hours in English (27 of which have to be at the 300/400 Level and 18 of which have to be from the list of Historical Breadth classes). I need 12 more credit hours in both Psychology and Religion. Amazingly my requirements equal out to 69 credits!

How Long This is Going to Take Me:
After trial and success and trial and near insanity, I have concluded that while working full-time I can handle 12 credit hours a year (15 if I take a class in the summer). Taking 12 credit hours a year it will take me 6 years to finish, taking 15 credit hours in a year it will take me 5 years.

Observation:
I’ve been working on my degree for two years now and my goal is to complete it in ten. The odds are in my favor!