Yale and its humanities

The best kept secret at Yale is a simple little site called yale.edu/oir. It touts itself as a “Yale Book of Numbers”—and by golly, there are a lot of them. For example:

Most popular undergraduate majors in 2008-09:

• Political Science (15%)
• History (12%)
• Economics (10%)
• Psychology (7%)

Approximate percentages of Junior and Senior majors in the Divisions:

• 40% Arts & Humanities
• 40% Social Sciences
• 20% Biological & Physical Sciences

Some more statistics: in 1975, 35% of Yalies went to law or business school a year after graduation; in 2008, the number is just 11%. In 2009, the Yale’s library spent $47.7 million in acquisition expenditures. Since 2001, Political Science majors have increased 57% and Psychology majors 69%; History has gone down 25%, and Biology 32%. The Physics and Philosophy major has stayed the same: .08% (that’s one person). 

By far the most telling statistic, though, is the overall composition of our class. Every year, approximately 40% of us major in Art & Humanities, 40% major in Social Sciences, and 20% major in Biology & Physical Sciences. At Stanford, it’s the opposite: 40% in hard sciences, 20% in humanities, and less than 15% in social sciences.