As Wellesley celebrates its 150th year, the College is highlighting a core value of Wellesley: “rooted in community.” And that community isn’t limited to the 55 departments and 500 acres of Wellesley’s campus. Thanks to cross-registration programs, students can take classes at several of the College’s neighboring institutions: MIT, Babson College, Olin College of Engineering, and Brandeis University.
“I’m a sociology major, so I was interested in taking some business-like classes,” says Abigail Horwitz ’26, who took courses for two semesters at Babson, a business-focused school just a six-minute ride from Wellesley on the Babson-Olin-Wellesley (BOW) shuttle.
As an economics and mathematics major, cross-registering at Babson was also a natural choice for Alexandra Jacala ’28, who took an introduction to accounting course with former Babson accounting professor Weerapat “Go” Attachot.
“[The class] was actually taught on the Wellesley campus, so Professor Attachot would come to Wellesley, every Monday and Wednesday,” says Jacala.
Wellesley students can also earn a Certificate of Management from Babson if they successfully complete three cohesive courses approved by Babson.
Wellesley students interested in engineering can register for courses at MIT and Olin. MIT, in Cambridge, is accessible via Wellesley’s Boston/Cambridge shuttle, known as “The Loco.” There, Wellesley students are eligible to participate in undergraduate research opportunities for credit and can work in larger labs with a diverse group of students. They are also allowed one meal per day on campus and have access to the university’s libraries. Through Olin, an eight-minute BOW shuttle ride from the College, Wellesley students can earn an engineering certificate by taking five engineering courses, four of which must be taken at Olin.
Jacala has also cross-registered at both MIT and Olin. They took a finance course at MIT Sloan School of Management, and they are currently taking an introductory engineering class on sensors, instrumentation, and measurement at Olin.
“Having that opportunity to meet people at Olin and Brandeis and Babson was extremely helpful for me to pop the bubble and realize, Wellesley isn’t just how many acres we have, but rather that perspective you bring to other places.”
Jordyn de Veer ’24
“It doesn’t really count toward my major, doesn’t count toward my distribution requirements, and honestly, I don’t really need the extra college credit,” Jacala says about the Olin course. But they hadn’t studied engineering since middle school, they say, and this seemed like a perfect time to revisit it.
Olin’s engineering students, meanwhile, often turn to Wellesley to fulfill their humanities concentration requirement. Nick Cunha, a junior at Olin, says the cross-registration program has been incredibly helpful. “I’m studying abroad in Italy,” he explains. “I wanted to do Italian studies and we have nothing like that at Olin. So I wanted to try it out [at Wellesley].”
Jordyn de Veer ’24, an anthropology and religious studies double major now pursuing a Masters in Art and Religion, wanted to stand out on applications for graduate programs in religious studies, a competitive field, and felt cross-registering at Brandeis, in Waltham, could help. She enrolled in a Biblical Hebrew class there “to just explore another language.”
Horwitz has also enrolled in Hebrew classes at Brandeis. “It was so nice to be able to get off campus, kind of get outside of the Wellesley bubble, and meet new people with new interests, and really just extend myself to perspectives that I wasn’t necessarily getting at Wellesley, whether that’s because I was meeting business students or Hebrew scholars,” Horwitz says.
As a Jewish student, she says, she found community at Brandeis, a historically Jewish institution. “I found a lot of support there,” Horwitz says. “I was able to really meet a lot more people like myself, and then I could go to Wellesley and come back with those lessons learned, and then encourage other students to cross-register at Brandeis.”
Enrolling in classes at nearby colleges offers not only an opportunity to take courses that aren’t available at Wellesley, but also a chance to network and make friends with students at neighboring schools. Wellesley students can also participate in many intercollegiate clubs and organizations, such as the Wellesley-Brandeis Orchestra, the BOW Figure Skating Club, and the MIT/Wellesley Toons.
“Having that opportunity to meet people at Olin and Brandeis and Babson was extremely helpful for me to pop the bubble and realize, Wellesley isn’t just how many acres we have, but rather that perspective you bring to other places,” de Veer says. “That’s just as beneficial as you getting to participate in other academic institutions as well. You bring that perspective and they bring theirs, so it’s equally, mutually beneficial.”
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Wellesley students are limited to taking one cross-registered course per semester. First-years may not cross-register in their first semester.
To be eligible to cross-register for a course, students must meet all prerequisites or equivalent coursework requirements and must get approval from both schools’ registrars.
For more information about cross-registering, visit the cross-registration website.