Academics at Mount Holyoke

Mount Holyoke exists to open minds. It’s where you explore new ideas, let your imagination run wild, debate vigorously and have the freedom to examine any topic or issue — no matter how controversial or polarizing. And like the brave, bold women who have come before you, we promise you this: After four years, everything will be different — including you.

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Liberal Arts and STEM: Making Impact

The oldest of the Seven Sister colleges, we are a noted leader in liberal arts education with a mission grounded in the conviction that women can — and should — make a difference in the world. The learning landscape at Mount Holyoke is shaped as much by curiosity and intensity as it is by collaboration and guidance. Here you’ll find people who brim with passion.

Montage photo of several students working on STEM projects

Mount Holyoke is a leader in STEM

Thirty-five percent of our students major in STEM — a significantly higher proportion of women than at coeducational institutions.

The Arts at Mount Holyoke

Whether you want to pursue a career in the arts or simply experience the challenge of something new, there's a place in the MHC arts community for you.

Students work on projects in the Fimbel Lab general workspace

The Fimbel Maker & Innovation Lab

Our 8,000-square-foot, fully loaded lab offers you the space and tools to test ideas and make new things — and make things new.

What do you want to study?

48 departmental and interdepartmental majors

Biology, politics and psychology are among the top five. Our fastest growing major? Computer science. Our newest? Data science.

Digital icons representing subjects such as biology, english, math, etc.

Top Majors: What makes them popular?

There are many opportunities for study at Mount Holyoke. Learn more about some of the most popular majors.

Professional and Graduate Education

We offer three graduate programs and 10 professional development institutes and over 100 graduate-level classes to choose from.

Interdisciplinary & Special Majors

If your interests fall outside departmental lines, we offer more than a dozen interdisciplinary majors as well as the opportunity to develop your own special major in a field of your choosing.

Enhance Your Learning

Dive deep into a subject and build specific expertise in your field. Our Lynk initiative provides funding for every student to complete a paid internship or research project — domestic or abroad. Work across disciplines in your classes and through independent study.

The Lynk: Curriculum to career

Rigorous coursework. A paid internship for every student. Research immersion. Languages. Performance. You’ll integrate your learning deeply here.

Nexus: Connect your courses to career goals

Create an individual program of study combined with an internship experience and present at the Learning from Application (LEAP) Symposium.

Group photo of students and alums in the Massachusetts Senate chamber

Leadership and Public Service

Public service sets you up to be a part of the solution through internships, workshops, seminars, site visits and the MHC Semester in D.C.

Faculty Research and Mentorship

Mount Holyoke’s faculty are active scholars, research scientists and creative artists who are passionate about their disciplines and their teaching. In small classes they will lead you to debate and discuss, challenging you and your classmates. You will be pushed to think critically and become a fearless advocate for yourself and what you believe in. Learn not just to face change, but to lead it.

Darby Dyar, Kennedy-Schelkunoff Professor of Astronomy, working with students in her lab

Princeton Review: Mount Holyoke faculty #1

Mount Holyoke College faculty were ranked No. 1 in “Professors Get High Marks” by The Princeton Review

Meet our newest faculty

Mount Holyoke faculty love teaching. They bring bring innovative, interdisciplinary scholarship to the College’s thriving intellectual community.

Photo of the Mount Holyoke faculty lined up before Convocation

Faculty News and Honors

Learn about the accomplishments as well as the many honors and awards received by Mount Holyoke faculty.

Learn about some of the research our faculty are doing

Major grant for dance research

Barbie Diewald, assistant professor of dance at Mount Holyoke College, is on a team of researchers looking to quantify dance with computer-based tools.

This is an abstracted neural stem cell on a teal background. It was made with mirrors, hand embroidery and paint.

Vaping perils

Maternal vaping affects offspring’s brains, says Associate Professor Jared Schwartzer of Mount Holyoke.

Patty Brennan, Visiting Lecturer of Biological Sciences

Evolution could lead to odd animals in future

Mount Holyoke College Assistant Professor Patricia Brennan discusses what evolution could mean for animals on a hotter, drier future Earth.

Darby Dyar, blond white woman in blue sweater seated at desk with three computer monitors and charts on the wall.

Fresh batch of Apollo 11 moon rocks for Dyar

Mount Holyoke professor Darby Dyar discusses her work with moon rocks on the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11’s launch.

Is Venus the new Mars?

Exploration of Venus could cast light on why planets become habitable, says Mount Holyoke’s Darby Dyar.

International Learning

Global competence is a must today, for citizenship and careers. Study abroad in one of more than 150 programs in 50 countries. Whatever you choose — language immersion, field studies, or a traditional classroom-based experience — you can find a program that gives you a powerful personal and intellectual experience to advance your academics.

This is a photograph of Donari Yahzid standing in a yellow ruffled dress, smiling.

Fulbright in Samoa

Donari Yahzid ’19 was awarded a Fulbright grant to study the effects of development on traditional culture in Samoa.

Reflections on studying abroad in Japan

K. J. Lewis ’22 shares her experience in the Hokkaido International Foundation’s Japanese Language and Culture Program and the advice she received from Professor of Asian Studies Naoko Nemoto before she went.

President Sonya Stephens awards Donari Yahzid her degree at Commencement 2019

Oh the places you will go… when you go to Mount Holyoke!

Donari Yahzid ’19 discusses how her experience at MHC Preview weekend helped her choose Mount Holyoke over the larger, co-ed, west coast colleges she was interested in. And how Mount Holyoke helped her travel the world and experience the unexplainable.

A woman wearing a blue shirt and black pants poses, holding her right leg over her head with her right hand, in a row of international flags on flagpoles on a green lawn, in Geneva, Switzerland.

Getting ahead of the game by way of Geneva

Geneva is the place for development studies, say seniors Javeria Kella and Davan O’Donnell, who are the first in Mount Holyoke’s new B.A./M.A. program.

Olivia Lucas (far right) with her host family on International Women's Day

Lessons in Identity, Culture, and Language in Cameroon

For Olivia Lucas ’18, multilingualism was her gateway to a new culture and experience of identity.

After Mount Holyoke

Mount Holyoke gets you where you want to go, in fields including medicine, law, business, social justice, communications, education and the arts. Within 10 years of graduating, nearly 80% of alums pursue an advanced degree at top-level institutions. Plus, you’ll join the most influential professional women’s network in the world: graduates of women’s colleges. Nearly 40,000 passionate Mount Holyoke alums around the globe are eager to welcome you to their midst.

Get to know some of our alums

Dr. Megan Young ’99, left, offers support to Edouard Joseph, 91, moments after giving him a COVID-19 vaccination. Both are in Joseph’s living room and both are masked.

Bringing the vaccine home

Mount Holyoke alum Dr. Megan Young ’99 is a home-based primary care doctor who is bringing the COVID-19 vaccine to homebound elders.

This is a photograph of Chloe Zhao raising her green mug to accept her Golden Globe at the ceremony which was held over Zoom.

Mount Holyoke alums at the Golden Globes

Alum Chloe Zhao won best director for best picture “Nomadland” and Suzan-Lori Parks wrote the screenplay that earned Andra Day the best actor award.

Public servants and alums Nita Lowey ’59 and Deborah Frank Feinen ’89 have been putting in long hours to protect their communities from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Public servants in a public health crisis

Mount Holyoke College helped prepare them to lead, say congresswoman Nita Lowey ’59 and Deborah Frank Feinen ’89, mayor of Champaign, Illinois.

Celebrants at the Frances Perkins Center 11th annual Garden Party

Mossaides ’73 presented with Steadfast Award

Mount Holyoke College Alumnae Association President Maria Mossaides ’73 was given the Steadfast Award by the Frances Perkins Center for her public service.

This is a photograph of Mahua Moitra speaking impassionedly before Parliament.

Mahua Moitra ’98 speech decries fascism

Mahua Moitra, Mount Holyoke College class of 1998, decried the “danger signs of early fascism” in India during her debut speech to Parliament.

Academic Centers

Want to become an agent of change? The academic centers at Mount Holyoke empower you to become globally competent, environmentally responsible and ready to lead. Each center can connect you to internships, programs, funding — and most importantly, inspiration and vision.