LANS - Liberal Arts/Natural Sciences at Birmingham or elsewhere. Experiences ?

[bellinisurge]

Dd starting 6th form college and is inspired (for her) the idea of Liberal Arts and Natural Sciences .
She's seen it at Birmingham and at UCL.

She'd want to major in Maths (currently doing Maths, Further Maths, Biology and - if she can get the course change from Chem - English Lit).
She enjoys Maths more than all the subjects but also enjoys Arts/Humanities. She's annoyingly good at pretty much everything and had strong GCSEs. She was interested in Natural Sciences but then saw those two places offering a combo with Liberal Arts - LANS

Does anyone have experiences of LANS and of only Natural Sciences?
Anywhere other than Birmingham and UCL for LANS - although she likes the look of Birmingham.

Particularly interested in experiences of Year Abroad.

Thanks

Hi OP, Hopefully others will reply with direct experience. In the meantime, are you aware of Exeter's Flexible Combined Honours course?

Most NatSci courses focus, as far as I can see, on the physical sciences with Maths much more as an adjunct. Also they rarely allow for much by way of non-STEM units. Lancaster NatSci had structured pathways that does allow, for example, up to 1/3rd or 2/3rds Maths but then with other science-based options.

One of my DC was interested in Birmingham's LANS and with the potential focus on Maths. However, they worked out that if they took 50-60% of units in Maths and then also subtracted the compulsory LANS units (these help unify the LANS cohort), there was not much left over for other subjects.

There is a Mathematical Sciences BSc at U of Southampton that allows up to 25% in certain non-STEM minors (An 'English' minor but not specifically 'Eng Lit' is available). You will probably be aware that Maths joint courses coupled with Philosophy or with modern foreign languages are available at many unis.

Funnily enough I was just looking at the Lancaster course and it suggests they do 2 x sciences with additional modules from either another science or something different:

“In the first year, all students begin with three pathways. You must choose two science pathways, and a third that can either be another science topic or you can select from elsewhere across the University, including a range of humanities and social sciences.”

DD is interested in biology, psychology plus maybe sociology.

Also, the Warwick Liberal Arts course allows for science options. I'm not sure whether maths is included.

Thanks all so much

Dd is about to start the LANS course at Birmingham. She wants to finish the course with a BSc in Natural Sciences but also have the option to take some other subjects as subsidiaries as she’s always been a bit of an all rounder. She’s taking modules in chemistry, biology and history this year. The year abroad really appealed to her, as did the programme of cultural and sporting events which the LANS team at Birmingham organise.

@Outnumberedbytwo , really appealed to my dd too. Good luck to them.

@PerpetualOptimist according to their website, you can do a Maths major

www.birmingham.ac.uk/schools/liberal-arts-and-sciences/programme-structure/possible-majors.aspx