Minors & Concentrations

A minor is a course of study in addition to your major. A concentration is a focus within your major. Practically any LaGrange College major can be taken as a minor – ask your faculty advisor for more information.

Listed below are the minors and concentrations not available as part of a major course of study.

Complete course requirements are listed in the Undergraduate Bulletin .

Dr. Joshua Van Lieu is passionate about preparing students to be citizens of the world.

Asian Studies
Designed to provide students with the opportunity to develop a basic facility in Korean or Japanese language and an understanding of the histories, cultures, religions, politics, and economies of East Asia. An Asian Studies minor can serve as a foundation for travel, study, or work in East Asia as well as for employment with companies in the United States that do business in East Asia or for further study at the graduate level in the fields of government, health care, journalism, social work, and law.

Coaching
A minor in coaching prepares future teachers and other students interested in pursuing coaching for a variety of roles in the coaching profession. The minor includes study of the physical, social and psychological elements of coaching athletics. In addition, courses include in-depth study of the methods and strategies of coaching individual and team sports and an application of these principles in an actual coaching setting.

Topics covered within the program include first aid, injury prevention and car, athletic management, sports psychology and sociology and physiology and anatomy.

When Alex came to LaGrange to play football, he also came to learn to be a successful businessman. A new concentration added this year was right up his alley.

Entrepreneurship
With a view to nurturing the entrepreneurial spirit in our students, the entrepreneurship concentration and minor are open to students from all disciplines and majors across campus.

Students have the opportunity to develop business plans for small businesses and work on special projects with businesses in the community. The focus is on experiential learning and active participation in and out of the classroom. Also explored: the concept of entrepreneurship as a mindset; social and political entrepreneurship.

French
A minor in French at LaGrange is designed to teach skills necessary for communicating with a variety of French-speaking peoples and to introduce their rich cultures, including their ideas, institutions and writings, past and present. It invites students to look at the impact these cultures have had on Western civilization and to examine all of them critically.

LaGrange College's liberal arts curriculum is designed to help graduates find employment that makes use of their skills, special knowledge, values and interests, even though the employment field may not be related to their academic major.

French and other foreign language studies teach skills that are essential to any career, among them problem solving, effective communication and the ability to perform complicated tasks.

Latin American Studies
In recent years, relations between the United States and its Latin American neighbors have taken on increasingly more social, economic and political significance, prompting new and original opportunities for Latin American Studies at LaGrange College.

If this region of the world interests you, ask your faculty advisor about this minor offered by the Department of Latin American Studies & Modern Languages, either as a precursor to graduate school or as a career warm-up. The program is open to students of all majors.

Literature
A concentration in literature is designed for students who wish to minor in English and broaden the scope of their career preparation. Courses help students hone their writing, critical thinking, primary and secondary research and text analysis skills.

Students taking degrees in pre-law, business, education, biology and pre-med may find this minor/concentration particularly valuable as they enter professions where excellent communications and writing skills are important. Students planning to enter graduate school will also discover that this minor/concentration offers a chance to learn skills important to primary research in the community and secondary research in libraries and databases.

Physics
A minor in Physics encompasses the study of the universe from the largest galaxies to the smallest subatomic particles. Coursework includes a year of calculus-based physics, Introduction to Modern Physics and Introduction to Quantum Mechanics, each of which includes a laboratory.

A physics minor prepares one to work in many different and interesting places – in industrial and government labs, on college campuses and in the astronaut corps. Many physics grads leave the lab behind and work at newspapers and magazines, in government and even on Wall Street – places where their problem-solving abilities and analytical skills are great assets.

Physical Education
Available to any student; emphasis is placed on understanding professional practices, effective teaching and classroom management.  Requires completion of the Core and includes such diverse courses as Sports Psychology, Principles of Strength, Condition and Nutrition for Athletes and Prevention and Care of Athletic Injuries and Illnesses.

Public History
The public history minor or concentration at LaGrange College provides students with a solid background in history and introduces them to such fields as archival and museum work, historical editing, historic preservation, costume conservation and design and archaeology. A crucial part of the program is an approved internship with a historical agency, historic site or other entity.

Public history professionals include museum curators, government and business historians, historical consultants, archivists, teachers, cultural resource managers, film and media producers, policy advisors, oral historians and others.

Sports Management
The multi-billion dollar sports industry doesn't just need athletes and coaches, but also those who can oversee and understand the business of sports. Managers in the sports industry work in many different areas. They deal with the financial and legal aspects of athletic organizations and clubs, develop marketing plans and campaigns, oversee athletics in a school setting or represent athletes during contract negotiations.

LaGrange's Bachelor of Business Administration with a concentration in Sports Management prepares students to apply business principles to the sport industry. It emphasizes team development and administration and financial management, as well as leadership and ethics in sports.

Internships are vital to the sports management experience. Students will be encouraged to pursue multiple internship opportunities during their time in the program.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics suggests that jobs in sports management will grow faster than average through 2014. These jobs are highly competitive. Students with superior preparation and internship experience will have the advantage needed.

Sustainability
A sustainability minor at LaGrange College points to the dual aspects of ecological and social responsibility that contribute to a just, sustainable and peaceful future.

This minor is sponsored by the departments of Biology, Political Science, Religion and Sociology & Anthropology. It requires successful completion of courses dealing with social justice, ecological sustainability, toxicology and a Capstone Research Project. Ask your faculty advisor for more details.

Women's Studies
The women's studies program at LaGrange College offers courses that explore women's participation and contributions in such areas as art, business, education, history, literature, music, politics, religion and sociology.

Many of these courses are cross-listed with other departments, and examine a range of issues that include women's health, images of women in popular culture, violence against women and diversity among women both within the United States and across the world.

Participants learn how gender affects the social, political, economic and cultural organization of societies and about how gender intersects with race, class and other aspects of identity to shape women's experiences.

His love of writing evolved during the last four years, and now he hopes to write for a sports magazine.

Writing
Emphasizing writing as a process, a minor in writing from LaGrange College helps students develop their research skills, enhances their understanding of the theoretical, interdisciplinary and professional aspects of writing, and fosters respect for language, for the contributions of peers, and for the value of effective communication.

The minor in writing is open to students majoring in any field, and prepares those proceeding on to graduate work for the challenges of advanced academic writing. It also signals to prospective employers the student's conscious preparation for the demands of the professional workplace.