Google Answers: Subjects taught in U.S. colleges

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Q: Subjects taught in U.S. colleges ( No Answer, 3 Comments )

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Subject: Subjects taught in U.S. colleges
Category: Reference, Education and News > Education
Asked by: gregorydove-ga
List Price: $75.00

Posted: 18 Jul 2006 07:42 PDT
Expires: 17 Aug 2006 07:42 PDT
Question ID: 747347

In 4 year colleges and universities in the United States, what are the ten most commonly taught subjects as measured by number of classes not by number of majors?
Request for Question Clarification by pafalafa-ga on 18 Jul 2006 11:30 PDT What do you mean by "subjects"? For instance, for an introductory class in microbiology, is the subject biology? Or microbiology? Or science? Similarly, a class in, say, Information Management in Business, can come under a number of subject headers, and may or may not be the same as a class in "Corporate Information Systems". And so on. Please clarify what it is you're after here. Thanks, pafalafa-ga
Clarification of Question by gregorydove-ga on 23 Jul 2006 04:47 PDT Good requests for clarification. I have data on how many degrees by 4 year U.S. colleges in each major subject (history, English, mathematics, ...etc.) but what I want is to know how many classes are taught in each of these major subjects. Every mathematics student has to take English, but English students don't often take many courses in mathematics. So the English departments of US four year colleges have more students relative to the number of those that get a degree in English compared with the Mathematics departments. Possible surrogates for this question would be: how many professors are there in each major department [since courses per professor may be comparable], or a bit further removed but possibly good enough would be average budgets of the major departments. Is this clearer?
Request for Question Clarification by pafalafa-ga on 23 Jul 2006 09:57 PDT Closest I can get you is a 2003 breakout (published in 2005) for broad categories of college/university study: Agriculture and Home Economics Business Education Engineering Fine arts Health Humanities Natural Sciences Social Sciences Other For instance, for Engineering, there are 33,400 full time faculty, representing 4.9% of all full time faculty in US colleges and universities (In contrast, the Natural Sciences group is the largest, accounting for 18.7% of all full-time faculty). The 33,400 full time engineering faculty is broken out as follows: Professor 37.6% Associate professor 25.3 Assistant professor 19.6 Instructor 9.1 Lecturer 2.0 Other 5.4 No rank 0.9 A similar set of stats is available on the 14,000 Part-time instructional faculty and staff in Engineering: Professor 5.9% Associate professor 5.7 Assistant professor 3.3 Instructor 25.3 Lecturer 9.3 Other 49.4 No rank 1.2 Would that sort of information for all the categories listed meet your needs as an answer to your question? Let me know what you think. pafalafa-ga
Clarification of Question by gregorydove-ga on 25 Jul 2006 16:07 PDT I need just a little more detail in what a subject is. Humanities is too broad. But you are very close. Here are the level of subjects I'm trying to get to [all of these are 'majors' and 'departments' in leading 4 year teaching and learning colleges: English [including composition, literature, creative writing, rhetoric, etc.] Foreign Language Political Science Economics Mathematics Philosophy Foreign Languages (any and all) Women's and/or Gender Studies Biology Chemistry Physics Engineering Anthropoloty Sociology Government Psychology History Area or Cultural Studies Visual Arts (fine art, art history, architecture, etc. Performing Arts (dance, theatre, music) Religion That's all. I think number of teaching staff (professors and instructors) is a very good surrogate for what I need. Budgets wouldn't be too bad either. -john
Request for Question Clarification by pafalafa-ga on 25 Jul 2006 18:32 PDT John, Wish I could help you, but the data you're looking for just doesn't seem to exist at the appropriate level of detail. However...Yet another possible surrogate suggests itself. How about the total number of degrees conferred per subject area. For instance, here's what the biological sciences category looks like (warning -- my very neat table might look very messy after I post it): BACHELORS MASTERS DOCTORATES TOTAL Biology/biological sciences, general ........................................................ \| 43,465 \| 2,529 \| 681 \| 46,675 Biomedical sciences, general ................................................................ \| 861 \| 169 \| 107 \| 1,137 Biochemistry ................................................................................ \| 3,849 \| 237 \| 489 \| 4,575 Biophysics .................................................................................. \| 43 \| 54 \| 78 \| 175 Molecular biology ........................................................................... \| 538 \| 116 \| 197 \| 851 Molecular biochemistry ...................................................................... \| 135 \| 12 \| 47 \| 194 Molecular biophysics ........................................................................ \| 0 \| 0 \| 11 \| 11 Structural biology .......................................................................... \| 0 \| 0 \| 6 \| 6 Radiation biology/radiobiology .............................................................. \| 2 \| 12 \| 9 \| 23 Biochemistry/biophysics and molecular biology ............................................... \| 286 \| 67 \| 62 \| 415 Biochemistry, biophysics and molecular biology, other ....................................... \| 44 \| 1 \| 6 \| 51 Botany/plant biology ........................................................................ \| 188 \| 104 \| 149 \| 441 Plant pathology/phytopathology .............................................................. \| 8 \| 66 \| 70 \| 144 Plant physiology ............................................................................ \| 0 \| 1 \| 12 \| 13 Plant molecular biology ..................................................................... \| 0 \| 1 \| 9 \| 10 Botany/plant biology, other ................................................................. \| 17 \| 9 \| 6 \| 32 Cell/cellular biology and histology ......................................................... \| 417 \| 31 \| 134 \| 582 Anatomy ..................................................................................... \| 88 \| 133 \| 51 \| 272 Developmental biology and embryology ........................................................ \| 0 \| 2 \| 25 \| 27 Neuroanatomy ................................................................................ \| 0 \| 0 \| 4 \| 4 Cell/cellular and molecular biology ......................................................... \| 1,237 \| 80 \| 243 \| 1,560 Cell biology and anatomy .................................................................... \| 4 \| 6 \| 14 \| 24 Cell/cellular biology and anatomical sciences, other ........................................ \| 362 \| 78 \| 107 \| 547 Microbiology, general ....................................................................... \| 1,471 \| 196 \| 136 \| 1,803 Medical microbiology and bacteriology ....................................................... \| 794 \| 91 \| 224 \| 1,109 Virology .................................................................................... \| 0 \| 2 \| 13 \| 15 Parasitology ................................................................................ \| 0 \| 0 \| 4 \| 4 Immunology .................................................................................. \| 0 \| 20 \| 123 \| 143 Microbiological sciences and immunology, other .............................................. \| 100 \| 41 \| 99 \| 240 Zoology/animal biology ...................................................................... \| 1,957 \| 139 \| 89 \| 2,185 Entomology .................................................................................. \| 76 \| 156 \| 106 \| 338 Animal physiology ........................................................................... \| 233 \| 44 \| 33 \| 310 Animal behavior and ethology ................................................................ \| 3 \| 2 \| 6 \| 11 Wildlife biology ............................................................................ \| 116 \| 14 \| 1 \| 131 Physiology, human and animal ............................................................................ \| 69 \| 12 \| 10 \| 91 Zoology/animal biology, other ............................................................... \| 0 \| 0 \| 0 \| 0 Genetics, general ........................................................................... \| 245 \| 45 \| 91 \| 381 Molecular genetics .......................................................................... \| 71 \| 22 \| 60 \| 153 Animal genetics ............................................................................. \| 114 \| 27 \| 54 \| 195 Plant genetics .............................................................................. \| 4 \| 12 \| 12 \| 28 Human/medical genetics ...................................................................... \| 0 \| 84 \| 57 \| 141 Genetics, plant and animal ...................................................................... \| 0 \| 5 \| 12 \| 17 Genetics, other ............................................................................. \| 0 \| 3 \| 7 \| 10 Physiology, general ......................................................................... \| 374 \| 311 \| 113 \| 798 Molecular physiology ........................................................................ \| 0 \| 5 \| 9 \| 14 Cell physiology ............................................................................. \| 0 \| 3 \| 10 \| 13 Endocrinology ............................................................................... \| 0 \| 4 \| 7 \| 11 Reproductive biology ........................................................................ \| 0 \| 1 \| 3 \| 4 Neurobiology and neurophysiology ............................................................ \| 160 \| 19 \| 63 \| 242 Cardiovascular science ...................................................................... \| 0 \| 0 \| 2 \| 2 Exercise physiology ......................................................................... \| 228 \| 31 \| 1 \| 260 Pathology/experimental pathology ............................................................ \| 26 \| 1 \| 8 \| 35 Oncology and cancer biology ................................................................. \| 9 \| 116 \| 167 \| 292 Medical physiology ................................................................. \| 0 \| 12 \| 47 \| 59 Physiology, pathology, and related sciences, other .......................................... \| 44 \| 2 \| 11 \| 57 Pharmacology ................................................................................ \| 46 \| 95 \| 219 \| 360 Molecular pharmacology ...................................................................... \| 0 \| 11 \| 24 \| 35 Neuropharmacology .................................................................................. \| 0 \| 5 \| 2 \| 7 Toxicology .................................................................................. \| 36 \| 60 \| 85 \| 181 Molecular toxicology ........................................................................ \| 0 \| 0 \| 3 \| 3 Environmental toxicology .................................................................... \| 15 \| 11 \| 23 \| 49 Pharmacology and toxicology ................................................................. \| 22 \| 7 \| 22 \| 51 Biometry/biometrics ......................................................................... \| 16 \| 66 \| 16 \| 98 Biostatistics ............................................................................... \| 16 \| 195 \| 85 \| 296 Bioinformatics .............................................................................. \| 42 \| 109 \| 10 \| 161 Biomathematics and bioinformatics, other .................................................... \| 3 \| 4 \| 2 \| 9 Biotechnology ............................................................................... \| 399 \| 398 \| 5 \| 802 Ecology ..................................................................................... \| 627 \| 220 \| 121 \| 968 Marine biology and biological oceanography .................................................. \| 791 \| 141 \| 39 \| 971 Evolutionary biology ........................................................................ \| 5 \| 21 \| 32 \| 58 Aquatic biology/limnology ................................................................... \| 60 \| 9 \| 0 \| 69 Environmental biology ....................................................................... \| 112 \| 13 \| 2 \| 127 Population biology .......................................................................... \| 0 \| 2 \| 13 \| 15 Conservation biology ........................................................................ \| 132 \| 26 \| 0 \| 158 Epidemiology ................................................................................ \| 0 \| 524 \| 150 \| 674 Ecology, evolution, systematics and population biology, other ............................... \| 299 \| 19 \| 35 \| 353 Biological and biomedical sciences, other ................................................... \| 1,250 \| 593 \| 259 \| 2,102 If needed, I can always post the full list as an excel file, so you can work it into a spreadsheet. Let me know what you think. paf
Clarification of Question by gregorydove-ga on 31 Jul 2006 11:05 PDT Sorry, paf, number of degrees is a surragote that I ruled out in the original question--I already had that data. The problem is that almost everyone takes English but few major in it and anyone who takes an engineering course or a business course is almost certainly majoring in it. Let me know if you find something. I won't be stingy if you really help me move this ball forward. -gregory

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Comments

Subject: Re: Subjects taught in U.S. colleges
From: myoarin-ga on 18 Jul 2006 13:58 PDT

By asking about the 10 most commonly taught courses, I think Paf's
worries are a concern.

The list of the 10 most common courses nationwide will probably include

Remedial English
European History 101  (? Renaissance/Reformation to ...?)
Introduction to Physics
    "         " Chemistry
Economics 101                 (think of some of the questions here)
Calculus 101
...

Subject: Re: Subjects taught in U.S. colleges
From: pafalafa-ga on 18 Jul 2006 17:06 PDT

Paf's not worried, mate... ;)

Subject: Re: Subjects taught in U.S. colleges
From: myoarin-ga on 18 Jul 2006 18:28 PDT

Whoops!  Obviously that should have read:  "Paf's worries are not a concern."

But he ain't worrying no ways, and I'll sign up for remedial English.  ;-)

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