FAQ for BSc COMP and Double Major BSc Programs

HKUST students cannot normally register two degrees, e.g., a BEng and BSc, at the same time. For this reason, students are not allowed to simultaneously register for a BEng in Computer Science and, say, a BSc in Mathematics or Physics. They are, though, allowed to simultaneously register for two majors in the same degree. The BSc(COMP) was specifically designed to allow interested students to simultaneously major in COMP and some other BSc major, e.g., MATH or Physics.

We note that, technically, UST does not have any double-major programs. Students register for two programs and must completely satisfy the full requirements of both programs. What makes this possible is that many of the ancillary components of the majors, e.g., English courses, GEE courses and basic math courses, can count towards the requirements of both majors.

The BSc degree retains all of the core COMP BEng requirements. The major differences are that Final Year project requirement has been removed and that the number of required COMP electives has been reduced from 7 to 5. This freeing up of credits will allow the students to get a double major with other fields.

According to HKUST regulations, any other BSc major could, theoretically be taken as a second major with COMP.

In practice, scheduling constraints make some 2nd major pairings impossible. Known workable pairings are COMP/MATH (for all MATH programs), COMP/PHYSICS, COMP/MAEC and COMP/RMBI.

This does not mean that other pairings are impossible. In fact, the double major was originally only designed with the MATH pairing in mind. Later combinations were added when interested students came to the CS department and asked if it was possible to set up a study plan allowing other possibilities. If you are interested in a pairing that is not listed above, please contact the BSc COMP coordinator.

Admission to the double major program requires the permission of both the CSE department and the 2nd department. We currently require a CGA of A- and the existence of a workable double-major study plan that allows them to finish within the standard 3/4 years.

In special cases we will accept students who have a B+ average but have shown exceptional performance in their major courses.

The first thing you should do is take the courses that would be necessary for double major students. For COMP, that requires taking COMP 104 as early as possible (a common mistake for students coming from outside the CSE department is taking COMP 102 instead). For MATH, that would require taking MATH 101 or MATH 102.

If you are all interested in the possibility of declaring a double major later, it is best for you to talk with the BSc COMP coordinator as early as possible. He/she will help you develop a reasonable study plan.

3 years for double majors between COMP and MATH, PHYSICS, MAEC and RMBI. This might require overloading in some semesters.

We have not worked out study patterns for double-majoring with other BSc programs. If you are interested in pursuing another pairing, please contact the BSc COMP coordinator.

Yes. Some MATH courses, such as MATH 111 and MATH 241, are required by the BSc COMP degree. Thus these courses count towards fulfilling requirements of both BSc MATH and BSc COMP.

In addition, the BSc COMP requires taking 5 COMP electives. Of these, with prior approval of the COMP UG Coordinator, up to 2 can be satisfied by taking computer science related courses in a non-COMP department. Some courses for which such approval has already been granted are:

• MATH 232: Combinatorial Analysis (not regularly offered)
• MATH 310: Game Theory (offered in Spring)
• MATH 315: Number Theory (offered in Fall)
• MATH 231: Numerical Analysis (offered in Fall)
• ELEC 101: Basic Electronics (offered in Fall)

Notice that the above list is not exhaustive; other non-CSE courses may also considered upon the approval of the UG director.

Various course substitutions may be allowed by different departments. For example, MATH 101 can be replaced by MATH 102, MATH 201 by MATH 202, MATH 301 by MATH 204 and MATH 110 by any 200-level or above MATH course.

The general principle is that any substitutions allowed by the department XXXX for their normal BSc programs are allowed for the double major COMP-XXXX program. Please seek approval from the XXXX UG coordinator concerning any substitutions of XXXX courses.

• for BEng students: fill in two forms at the same time: (1) the form to transfer from BEng program (e.g., COMP/CSIE/CPEG) to BSc COMP program (COSC), (2) the form to declare a dual program designation (e.g., MATH). Please note that MATH requires students to declare which major option (e.g., Applied Math, Pure Math, General Math) they wish to pursue at the time of declaring MATH as the second major. These forms can be obtained from Brenda Tam at the CSE General Office. The forms can be submitted to COMP UG Coordinator (via the CSE General Office) any time during a semester, however the transfer will only be effective at the beginning of the following semester.
• for students in other department who wish to pursue BSc COMP as the second major: please consult your major department on the declaration procedure.

Only one BSc degree will be awarded. For example, for students doing COMP+MATH:

• students whose 1st declared major was BSc COMP will get a BSc in Computer Science & Mathematics.
• students whose 1st declared major was BSc MATH will get a BSc in Mathematics & Computer Science.

Once enrolled in the double major, ARR will pre-register all required courses according to the study pattern of COMP-MATH(Gen Math) that appears in the Academic Calendar. This means that only the COMP+Gen Math study pattern is sure to have no time table clashes.

You should note, though, note that many double-major students, even COMP+Gen Math ones, do not follow the normal study pattern (e.g., because they want to go on exchange). In this case, there might also be time clashes.

In order to minimize the number of clashes the CSE department does provide some help with registration. In particular, our office staff will contact all registered BSc students prior to semester registration and ask for a list of all required courses (in both majors) that they need to take that semester. We then inform ARR so that are aware of your scheduling issues. This does not guarantee lack of scheduling conflicts but does help minimize them.

Yes, if you decide not to continue with the COMP-MATH double major you can switch back to BEng COMP. The extra courses in the BEng that were not required by the BSc that you will need to make up are:

• ELEC 101/102, IELM 120, IELM 311, Final Year Project (COMP 397/398), Industrial training, plus 2 more COMP electives.

Yes. The major of our double-major students do exchange out for a semester. There is an important caveat here, though. Most of the students who did exchange out entered HKUST in year 0, e.g., as EAS or mainland students and spent 4 years studying at HKUST. Doing an exchange during a 4-year program, even a double-major one, is easily possible.

Students who enter UST via JUPAS to take the standard 3-year program, though, will probably NOT be able to do a double major and exchange out for a semester.

A student doing COMP+MATH must satisfy the requirements of both programs. The individual GEE requirements of the programs (for students admitted prior to 2010-2011) are:

• BSc COMP: 1 HUMA, 1 SOSC, 4 HUMA/SOSC/SCIE/SB&M
• BSc MATH: 1 HUMA, 1 SOSC, 1 ENGG, 1 SB&M, 2 HUMA/SOSC

Since students doing a BSc COMP+MATH are enrolled in programs in both the Schools of Science and Engineering, they do not have to take a GEE in Science or a GEE in Engineering. So, the GEE requirements are:

• BSc COMP+MATH: 1 HUMA, 1 SOSC, 1 SB&M, 2 HUMA/SOSC

Note: the above information is for students who entered (year 1) BEFORE Fall 2010. Students who entered in year 1 in Fall 2010 or afterwards have common core requirements instead of GE ones. These students will have to satisfy the common core requirements of both programs. Please see the official requirements in the program catalog. Especially note that the BSc(COMP) and all Science BSc programs include a clause stating that double major BSc/Science students may use 3 credits of free electives to substitute for 3 credits of Science & Technology (S&T) common core.

Students who declare BSc COMP as the second major also need to register and pass COMP001/2/3. These are 0 credit courses requiring students to meet with faculty advisors a few times a semester. Students are required to register for the appropriate section during semesters they are in residence at UST in the program. As an example, students who enter the program in the Spring semester of year one and go on exchange in Spring semester of year two will be expected to register for COMP 001 (Spring), COMP 002 (Fall) and COMP 003 (Fall and Spring semesters). Students who declare the second major in Year 2, and thus missed COMP001, should declare COMP001 and COMP002 at the same time in the Fall semester.

No. Double major students do not have to register for the final year project course. They may do a final year project or final year thesis if they want to, though. In those cases, the FYP/FYT will count as two COMP electives.

No. If a double major, i.e., BSc COMP student, does want to take an industrial training module, he/she will need to ask for special permission to register. If you are interested in pursuing this, please ask the BSc COMP coordinator for more information.

Technically, yes, but this would be difficult and probably require a lot of overloading.