By Zack Sevdy, Reporter

Before the morning frost clings to the grass, and the sun has barely risen, some Berry College students are already at work. In scrubs under fluorescent hospital lights, checking vitals and preparing medications, nursing students move quietly between floors of their hospital building. In the fields where cows graze and chickens peck, animal science students pull on boots covered with mud and work to keep production flowing and livestock fed.

Though their mornings unfold in different places, a connection runs
between them. It hints at something larger about college life and the way a chosen path can shape how hard that journey feels.

Choosing a major determines a student’s college journey. It influences their potential career path, the classes they take, and the academic pursuits they pursue.

All majors are hard, but who decides that? Professors? Classes? The workload? The prerequisites? Postgraduate expectations? Is there even a model for comparison without being subjective?

Students say the word “hard” does not adequately encapsulate the scale of the rigor they experience.

Even the phrase ‘academic rigor’ resists a single definition.

In regard to Animal Science and Nursing, when a word inadvertently pits two majors against each other, deciding which is more difficult is impossible. In reality, it is something else entirely. A different question must be asked of the source of Berry College’s largest population besides the deer: students. Rather than comparing which major is harder, students across disciplines define academic rigor as something far more complex than competition.

STUDENTS’ PERSPECTIVE ON RIGOR

Berry has built its reputation in Georgia as an academically adept school. It is nationally recognized for having one of the best four-year college experiences, with a long list of highly accredited majors that prepare students to stand out in the workforce.

AllOnGeorgia says, “Berry has been recognized nationally for both its academic excellence and overall value. Rankings highlight the college’s rigorous programs, high retention rates, and strong outcomes for graduates.” The college is also accredited in its Health Science department, but the two majors that stand out on the list are Nursing and Animal Science.

The reason is the work they demand. Nursing students complete clinical rotations that place them directly in patient care settings with real-life and often critical circumstances. Animal science majors spend hours in barns, labs, and fields, practicing livestock management and animal care. From the outside, both appear undeniably rigorous, but on the inside, students explain that it is an immeasurable experience.

All majors are hard, but who decides that?

THE LENS TO ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE

Riley Roberts, a junior Nursing Major, discusses how rigor can’t truly be defined in words.

“I think academic rigor can have a lot of definitions. For me, it’s time and dedication seen in and out of the classroom, along with the quality and difficulty of what you’re learning, and how in-depth it goes.”

Roberts’ perspective sheds light on how nursing has redefined what academic performance means.

“Academic rigor is not something that is forward-facing. You have to apply it in multiple facets.”

For her, rigor shows up in early mornings and late nights. She studies hundreds of presentation slides to prepare for a check-off and an exam, all while shouldering the emotional discipline required to care for patients.

The real-world application required of a Nursing Major extends far beyond memorization. As Roberts says, it demands students think critically, analyze situations on flashcards that apply to real life, and practice skills in environments that could become very real scenarios where outcomes are rarely predictable.

WHEN “DIFFICULT” STOPS BEING SO SIMPLE

Roberts often hears students use the words “difficult” or “hard” to describe the level of work required to meet a course’s criteria, typically within their major or class. However, even that is subjective.

“The word hard is not a true measure of something,” she says. She uses a class she is currently taking as an example to expand upon her point.

“Pharmacology is a hard class, but that’s because there is a lot of critical thinking within the course. There is no obvious black-and-white answer when it comes to exams. Also, the test questions are real scenarios; there is no room for error.”

In nursing, rigor is not defined solely by workload or content difficulty, but by the expectation that students apply knowledge in highly stressful, analytically complex situations.

“You can only memorize so much,” Roberts says, “but if you can’t apply it, it doesn’t matter.”

In nursing, this is especially important, as it demonstrates whether someone has truly grasped the material. While that is a factor, her experience is a strong indicator of competence. While all jobs naturally separate those who are capable and those who are not, in nursing, that matter is regarded with the utmost importance.

“A lot of people worry about being good at their jobs, but with my major, it translates to future situations where if I don’t know something, my patient could die. It’s a life or death situation.”

Roberts stresses how vital it is for nursing students to acquire knowledge that eventually becomes second nature, drawing on her experience as a student.

Across campus, in another corner of Berry, an Animal Science Major whose work is focused on the animal behind the human adds a second perspective.

A DIFFERENT KIND OF DEMAND

“The leash between human and animal is really what connects nursing and animal science… Both are hard in different ways but are equally important,” says Makenzie Cochran. “You have to be in the major to really understand it.”

Cochran, an Animal Science Major, has studied at Berry for almost 4 years. Her academic career has focused on gaining a broad knowledge of beef systems, animal anatomy, and veterinary skills.

While nursing students navigate emotional intensity and clinical pressures, animal science students are confronted with a different kind of pressure, one that puts learning at the center of the experience in this field of study.

In animal science, there are multiple tracks that a student can take. The workload for each track affects the rigor and difficulty they entail.

Cochcran says, “[the amount of rigor] is based on whether you’re pre-vet or if you’re production management. If you apply to vet school, or work at an animal unit. Applying for jobs, it’s a lot of balance, having to do clinic hours and managing homework.” For her, rigor depends heavily on a student’s track and the breadth of the field itself.

“Taking science-based classes and excelling at them is a big part of it. Not to mention taking multiple classes and excelling at them all at the same time.”

Unlike majors that focus on a single aspect in a semester, animal science covers a wide range of subjects to ensure students gain a firm understanding of the various fields that differentiate the tracks.

In one semester, Cochran says that you might take classes that have nothing to do with each other, and in others, you are being force-fed everything there is to know from avians to horses.

“Berry’s animal science program is so ‘animal-focused’,” she jokes, “that we learn about seven different species, even if you don’t go into studying all of them in the future.”

This variety adds a level of complexity that requires her to strain her study methods at both extremes: one that is animal-related, and the other science-related.

“Birds, sheep, horses, cows, goats, dogs… It’s always something different. And even on top of that, you’re learning about anatomy, physiology, genetics, and immunology.”

But in animal science, rigor extends beyond academics. She comes back to the topic of tracks.

“It truly does depend on what track you take,” Cochran says. “If you’re pre-vet, you have a lot of clinic hours where you’re working, hands-on, with animals. You’re taking vitals, taking care of people’s pets, and making sure they stay healthy.”

Rigor is not defined by the difficulty of a classroom.

WHEN “DIFFICULT” STOPS BEING SO SIMPLE

A word is only so simple. Thinking that a word is simple is misleading. To fully realize what “academic rigor” means, one must peer past the surface and travel to deeper waters. This means looking at how broad the course material is, the quality of teaching, and how much a program pushes students to think critically.

Additionally, rigor is about how much effort and focus students need to put in to actually succeed. For nursing and animal science students at Berry College, showing up, doing the work, and maintaining forward-facing grit, even when things may feel uncertain or unattainable, is what matters.

For them, living in it each day, rigor is not defined by the difficulty of a classroom, exam, bedside scenario, clinical, or barn hours. It is in the days of struggle that the reason to keep going appears in the work they do for others, driving them toward the reward.

That is the real rigor.