Major trends

"I've got so many religion majors lining up outside my door, I literally have no free time right now - no time for my research."

Where there's "hot," there's also "not." After several red-hot years in the 1990s, computer science has cooled.

The number of new undergraduate students in computer science fell 7 percent in the past school year (at large institutions that offer PhD programs), according to the Computing Research Association in Washington.

For example, at George Washington University, there were 60 freshmen computer-science majors last year and only 33 this fall.

At Virginia Polytechnic Institute, the number of freshmen signing up for computer science fell from about 400 to 300, says Verna Schuetz, associate department head. "We see this as part of a national phenomenon," she says.

In one of college life's little ironies, it appears that negative publicity surrounding the bookkeeping sleight of hand at companies such as Enron and WorldCom may be injecting fresh interest into the venerable accounting major.

Arizona State University in Tempe; Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pa.; and Hilbert College in Hamburg, N.Y.; said in response to a Monitor query that they are seeing a surge of interest in accounting.

Jose Herrera teaches accounting at Arizona State and has been surprised that, after several years of weakening interest in accounting, the school now has to turn away some accountancy candidates.

"Enron and the rest of the news have been negative," he says. "But it's still provided us with exposure to people who ordinarily wouldn't know what an accountant does. They may have thought accountants were just pencil pushers, but they're realizing accountants have a major impact."

Classes on "fraud examination" have been particularly popular since the Enron fiasco began in 2001, says Sandra Augustine, a professor at Hilbert. The school started an Economic Crime Investigation program in 1999 with about 60 students who chose it as a major. By this fall, the number had risen to 147.

"My own daughter started out on the computer side of things - and now she's shifted over to accounting," Ms. Augustine says. "There's this perception that accounting is dull, boring. But the scandals have changed that to some degree."

By far the hottest majors, however, appear to be criminal justice and forensic science - both fueled by a push for homeland security and pop-culture television shows, professors and students say.

At West Virginia University in Morgantown, the Forensic Identification Program is the fastest-growing degree program on campus. Enrollment has more than doubled, from 200 students last January to 400-plus this fall.

Back at Baylor, Susan Wallace, director of the forensic-science program, says she had to fight to get support for the new major in 1995. It was finally approved in 1999. Enrollment has grown almost 10-fold, from 39 majors the first day it was offered to 350 now.

Clearly that interest is not derived from any olfactory rewards. Out in back of the school's new state-of-the-art forensics laboratory, Dr. Wallace buries dead pigs and other animals in a plot of ground. After the animals decay, students unearth and analyze the results. The school also has a special trailer for field trips to crime scenes.

For Ms. Soland, part of the appeal is the hands-on nature of field work; it's less clinical and theoretical than pre-med, she says. Also, the value of assisting families by identifying remains was driven home to her after the 9/11 attacks.

"Before, I was concerned more about saving someone's life," Soland says. "But with forensics, that helps the surviving family find out what happens."

Soland says she wasn't motivated by the popular but grisly "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation" TV show.

But, she adds, "I'm sure it is a big lure to incoming freshmen.... I've watched the shows, too - and pretty much all my friends can't get enough of them."

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