If any of you were like me, in the time before your high school years, you were extremely ambitious. You set bars higher for yourself than anyone else. You constantly thought, “Sure! I can do that!” And it was a rare moment where you weren’t downing yourself in work because you always go above and beyond expectations on your work.

So it comes as no surprise that this work drive traveled with me to my freshmen year of college. I entered originally as music with an outside field major in psychology with my instrument as cello. I had goals of pursuing research in music cognition as a career in order to combine my love for music and psychology. Unfortunately, life had a different plan for me. All the courses I was most interested in like cognition, behavioral neuroscience, and neurobiology were all beyond my reach because there were too many prerequisites to meet that would fit in my outside study. So I had a choice. Either come up with a new life plan or go after my dreams while creating my own crazy path.

Based on what you know the title of this article, I chose the latter. Yes, officially now I am a dual degree student in psychology and music with an outside study in neuroscience. This essentially means I will now graduate college with two pieces of paper in the end. However, I soon learned that this was an untraveled road for students at Ithaca College. There is no set dual degree program and the handful of students who did pursue a dual degree path didn’t combine the School of Music and the School of Humanities and Sciences.

First, I was originally told that being a dual degree student in these fields was not a viable option. In fact, if I did choose this that I would be here for an extra year with no financial help. Further, neither school knew anything about the other’s program. I had a music advisor and a psychology advisor, both of which don’t understand what being a dual degree student means or how to work around the numerous extra courses in my schedule.

Here’s my advice for you: if you are a student at Ithaca College and you want to be a part of this dual degree rollercoaster, Academic Advising will become your new best friend. During this academic whirlwind, I became confused with CLA requirements, ICC requirements, meeting all of the mandatory courses and fitting in liberal arts classes, but no one seemed to be able to help me. Until the day I was blessed with the knowledge of Academic Advising Services.

I walked in with about a thousand forms and excel sheets in arm and a very defeated attitude as I felt I chose the wrong school and program for me to achieve my dreams of this interdisciplinary major. But within a few minutes of discussing my options and laying out the next four years at IC, I learned my plan would be intense, but essentially doable. I learned I carried over enough earned college credits from high school that they actually sufficed to meet all the liberal arts courses required of my psychology degree. I also learned tricks of sneaking around the system where my CLA requirements could overlap with my majors, like double dipping. This meant that I could graduate in four years. This meant my dreams could actually be accomplished. Granted, I’d be taking a maximum amount of credits every semester and I’d never be able to study abroad (but that’s what summer is for), however, in my eyes it was worth it.

And for those of you who wonder how I have time for a life outside of all my academic studies, it’s actually really simple. I organize… a lot! I do my best not to waste too much time on Netflix, do homework in the random slots of time I have in my schedule, and learn how to compromise. But I still have a job as an Resident Assistant, I go down to the Commons on weekends, find time to practice, participate in SLIs and clubs on campus. People seem amazed how I’m still standing despite all my work and non-stop moving, but I love every second of it. I whole-heartedly believe that I’m on the best path and this is the perfect place to be for me. All the effort put into making this dual degree dream happen just proves that this is possible to accomplish and for anyone considering a program like this, I say go for it!