Over its more than 40 years as one of Canada’s most innovative programs, Arts & Science at McMaster has established an enviable reputation for providing an educational environment that equips its graduates to excel in work and/or further study in a wide variety of fields.

The program offers an enriching, interdisciplinary learning community where you will be exposed to multiple perspectives and develop essential skills while also feeling supported throughout your academic journey. Its limited size facilitates close relationships between students, both academically and personally, while small class and tutorial sizes promote lively interaction between professors and students.

The individual and collective expertise of Arts & Science faculty members enables the Program to continue to forge new ground in undergraduate education. Our instructors, who have diverse disciplinary backgrounds, work closely with students in the creative process of interdisciplinary inquiry.

In the B.Arts Sc. Honours degree, students take specifically designed ARTSSCI courses as well as electives. Students can use their electives to pursue a Combined Honours Program (Arts & Science may be combined with over thirty different subjects from across the University), to focus on a particular area (a minor), or to satisfy broad interests. The integrated set of required courses, offered exclusively to Arts & Science students, include Inquiry courses, which cover a range of disciplines and focus on the development of inquiry-based learning and critical thinking skills vital to meaningful social and scholarly engagement.

Electives, experiential learning initiatives, and exchange opportunities allow students to tread new paths of discovery, while individual study and fourth-year thesis courses provide an opportunity to work with McMaster researchers from across the University. The program prepares students for a variety of future endeavours, and has a tradition of producing graduates who shine in a remarkable array of meaningful careers.

Students have access to the Arts & Science Space in L.R. Wilson Hall and opportunities to participate in a variety of extracurricular learning experiences such as the Common Reading Program and the New World of Work Series.