Brain & Cog Sci at Rochester

[Robbie Jacobs]

 DEPARTMENT OF BRAIN AND COGNITIVE SCIENCES, UNIVERSITY OF ROCHESTER
 -------------------------------------------------------------------

 The University of Rochester has formed a new academic department
 called the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences.

 (Please note that Rochester has terminated its Department of Psychology.)

 This message contains information about this new department, and is
 specifically oriented towards individuals seeking graduate education.

 Members of the Department study how we see and hear, move, learn and
 remember, reason, produce and understand spoken and signed languages, and
 how these remarkable capabilities depend upon the workings of the brain. We
 also study how these capabilities develop during infancy and childhood, and
 how the brain matures and becomes organized to perform complex tasks.  Our
 research interests span a large domain and straddle several disciplines in
 the behavioral, neural and computational sciences, but all our work is
 connected by the idea that to understand behavior we must study not only
 behavior but also the processes--both neural and computational--that underlie
 it.  While the faculty have active research programs in many regions of
 this large domain, there are parts in which the Department, as well as the
 surrounding University community, has notable concentrations of strength.
 One large group of faculty and students focus their research on
 understanding the visual system and its organization and function; another
 major group investigates the nature of language processing and language
 acquisition; a third group, which cuts across and links those who
 investigate perception, language, and neurobiology, studies the nature of
 learning and development.

 Graduate education is a central part of academic life in the Department.
 Our faculty's research programs are structured in a way that includes
 graduate students as essential partners--as our junior colleagues and future
 peers--and we commit a great deal to their training. The essence of our
 program is training for research in the disciplines that constitute the
 brain and cognitive sciences, and the program is designed to ensure that
 students develop rapidly into independent researchers.

 This very brief summary can give you only a sketchy sense of our
 Department, and I would encourage you to get in touch with us if you would
 like to learn more about us or apply for admission to the graduate program.
 If you have access to the World Wide Web you can find a great deal of
 information about us and our research and graduate programs by going to:

        http://www.bcs.rochester.edu/bcs/

 Our Web site provides most of what you will want to know about our program,
 and it also enables you to submit an electronic application.  If you would
 like to discuss our program with a member of the Department, please call
 Bette McCormick (716-275-1844) who will put you in touch with someone who
 can help.  Bette can also mail you a brochure that provides much more
 information about the program and the Department.  As a last resort, feel
 free to contact me (Robert Jacobs) via e-mail (robbie at bcs.rochester.edu)
 with additional questions or concerns.