Department and Program Information

You should consult the College Catalog for requirements for both the major and the minor, as well as for the interdisciplinary programs. Along with the catalog, you should also consult the individual department or program websites. Each academic department and program lists projected courses for the next two years on their website to the best of their ability. Future course projections are tentative and change over time.

Many departments and programs offer information session during the first three weeks of the Spring semester. 

For Faculty

General instructions for Faculty access to view Sophomore Plans:

Go to the Majors and Minors Departmental Portal: www.swarthmore.edu/appgarden

In the Majors and Minors Departmental Portal, all faculty and departmental administrative staff can read students' sophomore plans and can review lists of majors/minors for their own departments/programs. But, only chairs, AAs and coordinators can enter decisions or assign advisors.

How to view plans? In the portal, click on the magnifying glass or the PDF icon to the left of the student’s name. The very first time that you want to access the PDFs, you will need to:

  1. Click on the tab that you want (e.g.“Sophomore Plan Submissions”)
  2. Click on the “Action” button
  3. Select “Reset” option
  4. Click on “Apply” button

Note: The Sophomore Plan PDFs are only available if you are accessing the portal from on-campus, or via a VPN connection.

Problems? Some faculty might find that they are not seeing all the plans that they should in the portal. For example, someone might find that she can see plans for students in her home department, but not plans for students in her affiliated programs. If you encounter this problem, please email registrar@swarthmore.du

For Sophomore Plan Advisors:

How do I access a list of students for whom I will serve as their Sophomore Plan Advisor? After your department or program Administrative Assistant has advised you that assignments are complete for your department or programs:

  1. Go to the Majors and Minors Departmental Portal in appGarden.  (Sophomore Plan Advisor assignments do not appear in Faculty Services.)
  2. Click on the Majors/Minors left-hand tab. Select the Majors or Minors option, depending on whether you'd like to see prospective Majors or Minors.
  3. Select the relevant class in the drop-down menu. This summons a list of all students in a given class year who have indicated a major or minor in your affiliated department/programs.
  4. Click on the Sophomore Plan Advisor column heading to sort the column in the order of Advisor Name, or click on your name to only see your Sophomore Plan Advisees.

What is a Sophomore Plan Advisor? 

A Sophomore Plan Advisor is a faculty advisor who meets with sophomores in February to help them craft a viable sophomore plan. 

  • Who? In some departments, Sophomore Plan Advising is done by one faculty member for all sophomores. In other departments this responsibility falls on multiple faculty members. Your department chair or administrative assistant will tell you if you have Sophomore Plan advising responsibilities.
  • For how long? Duration of the Sophomore Plan process. In some departments, a student's Sophomore Plan Advisor also then becomes their major or minor advisor upon acceptance or deferral. 
  • Course Minors? Many departments do not assign Sophomore Plan Advisors for prospective course minors.

Major and Minor Department Portal instructions for department chairs, program coordinators and administrative assistants [PDF]