Grace College recently added a concentration in neurobiology to its portfolio of more than 100 majors, minors and concentrations. The school will partner with the Lower Cost Models for Independent Colleges Consortium (LCMC) to offer the biology concentration as a hybrid degree. Students enrolled will blend traditional in-person Grace courses with four online LCMC courses.
“There is really nothing quite like neurobiology at Grace College,” said Dr. Joe Frentzel, Dr. Eugene Inman Endowed Chair of Science and Mathematics at Grace. “It blends the most interesting aspects of two disciplines – behavioral and biological sciences – in creating a distinct concentration that is tailored to someone who wants to learn about how the brain functions in controlling human behavior and thoughts.”
The neurobiology concentration blends neuroscience coursework through LCMC with courses from Grace’s biology major as well as its School of Behavioral Science. Courses from these programs, such as Advanced Anatomy & Physiology I and Abnormal Psychology, lay the groundwork for neurobiology-specific courses such as Biological Basis of Perception and Movement, Cognitive Neuroscience and Clinical Neuropathology.
According to Frentzel, the LCMC taps four leaders in the National Neuroscience Curriculum Initiative (NNCI), a collaboration between educators and neuroscientists that seeks to make core neuroscience concepts available to a broader audience, to develop the program’s coursework. This group includes Dr. David Ross, professor of psychiatry at the Yale School of Medicine.
Frentzel says this is an ideal concentration for biology students who are interested in how the brain accomplishes speech processing or for those seeking to diversify their electives to include neuroscience coursework.
“Even those studying pre-medicine or behavioral sciences are well-suited to take these elective courses to complement their major, grow their knowledge base and understand the complexities of cognitive functioning,” said Frentzel. “The addition of this concentration at a Christian liberal arts institution like Grace excites me, because it is a stimulating pathway for us to legitimize and further explore our belief in an intelligent design.”
To learn more about the neurobiology concentration at Grace, visit www.grace.edu/programs/biology-major-neurobiology-concentration/. For more information about the LCMC subject matter experts who created the degree, go to www.thelcmc.org/programs/neuroscience.
