From genome sequences, genetic modification, and cloning, to ecosystems and impending mass-extinctions, biology is the science of the 21st century — and the one that most directly impacts our lives. The Biology Department at Whitman College seeks to hone students’ skills in analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating major conceptual areas of the field. We also require research experience that provides hands-on experience in scientific research.

As a biology major at Whitman, you will take a core of courses that deal with the science of living things and with phenomena of life. The basic courses are designed to introduce the fundamental principles and methods of biology and a broad spectrum of subdisciplines, including botany, ecology, genetics, cell biology, and physiology. You can delve into areas of special interest for your upper-level elective courses. The curriculum provides a rigorous foundation that will prepare you for professional and graduate schools in the biological sciences. Indeed, over the past 20 years, more than 60 percent of Whitman biology graduates have attended post-collegiate education — graduate school in the biological sciences, health-related professional studies, or other graduate work.

In addition, we have designed introductory and upper-level biology courses in such a way that students with an interest in medical or other professional schools, but who prefer to major in a field other than biology, may complete the requirements and perform well on entrance examinations.

You may also combine biology with other fields of study as a combined major. For example, you may combine biology with the study of environmental issues as viewed from the perspective of diverse fields and be a biology-environmental studies major, or combine biology with geology. We also offer a 3-2 biology-oceanography program with three years at Whitman followed by two years at the University of Washington. Alternatively, you may focus on the molecular nature and composition of living systems by selecting a new major at the interface of the physical and biological sciences. This major in Biochemistry, Biophysics and Molecular Biology (BBMB) will prepare you for a career in fields such as biotechnology, pharmacology, health care, or research in diverse aspects of biology.

As your level of knowledge and experience in the field increases, you will take comprehensive written and oral exams that test your patterns of biological thinking. Each biology and combined major also completes a research-based senior thesis. Some students do research at other institutions during the summer; others complete a project under the supervision of a Whitman faculty member. These projects involve field or lab research in which you design and carry out experiments, analyze data, and write up the project. As faculty, we put a great deal of effort into supervising these projects, helping you to identify the problem, design experiments, analyze the findings, and prepare a formal written thesis and oral seminar.

The faculty of the Biology Department is highly accessible and committed to student-faculty collaborative research projects. Department faculty members regularly publish articles in peer-reviewed journals. Many of these list undergraduate students as coauthors.