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<p>hmm, fascinating</p>
<p>Well it seems like most people here already had a plan…
I’ve been taking math, engineering, biochemistry classes, getting As without much real interest in them, so I could potentially be a premed and go for that salary, but I don’t want to. If I choose a career I’m not interested in just for the money, my life is going to BLOW. It’s not that I have no clearly defined academic passion… it’s that I likely haven’t found it yet. There’s no way to take intro classes in all 100+ or so majors too, and no way to truly find out about other subjects. All the advisers do is ask you what you want to do and figure out your courses for you, so that’s useless. I think I’d be even more clueless and waste time with a year off, and I wouldn’t mind going to graduate school. Such a headache… :S</p>
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Yeah that could be true. Or maybe your life might be filled with happiness like several of my friends who went into lucrative fields despite their lack of “passion” in said field. </p>
<p>I just don’t understand this mentality here. When you’re a 22 year-old making 60-70 at a time when most adults are scared sh**less about losing their jobs and homes and providing for their families, you’d have to be crazy to complain about intellectual dissatisfaction. Yeah, your life’s gonna be miserable if you can’t analyze Hegel and Kant despite your stable job, nice home, and stocked 401Ks. Meanwhile, that miserable postdoc who DOES analyze Hegel and Kant on a bus driver’s salary, and who doesn’t know if he’ll have funding next semester, is drooling with envy at your life.</p>
<p>no i knew what i was doing</p>
<p>Caillebotte, I have to show my support for what you’re saying. I haven’t experienced any of this myself considering I’m an undergrad, but my sister (who’s recently graduated from college with a more “impractical” degree) and many of her friends, who have done the same, are going through the same issue as you. Heck, many people I personally know who are in their early twenties are experiencing it as well.
As much as I love the arts and whatnot, I know that if I want to not be struggling just to make ends meet upon my graduation from college, I will have to major in something that will make employers take me seriously. They are looking for people with quantitative skills and lucrative majors over English majors, or German Studies majors. I know that if I majored in something like English and didn’t at least go onto grad school, I’d have a very tough time getting hired. That’s not something I want for myself, selfish as it may sound. My personal philosophy is that if I’m going to spend a butt load of money and time/effort on 4 years of college, that I want to get an actual worthy job from it.</p>
<p>However, this brings me to another question. What are some good “practical” majors for someone who is absolutely terrible at everything math- or science-related?</p>
<p>@Caille</p>
<p>And I know people who are making bank coming out of top schools with majors any where from art history (consulting) to east asian studies (finance)… Major won’t hurt your chances but you know what will? A bad GPA, bro</p>
<p>^^I’m not going to pledge expertise either, but unless the art history took certain classes in college, how would he/she have the knowledge necessary to do consulting? If I was investing, I would be terrified if my advisor was a recent graduate of even an Ivy League School who had nothing but a BA in Jewish Studies or something.</p>
<p>You can learn the mechanics on the job in a few weeks, but you can’t become intelligent or personable in that timeframe. Recruiters look for those qualities in GPA and interviews, not major choice.</p>
<p>Though I mean a significant amount of coursework in finance (like you can get at Wharton or through an MBA) helps too. But many people get hired without previous experience.</p>
<p>Another thing to be noted is that those “Art History” and “East Asian Studies” majors are coming from the very top schools in the country for the most part. Yankees20 is pretty spot on too. Large consulting firms and investment banks typically have a few top schools they recruit from, and they go there with the assumption these individuals are smart enough to get into these schools and do well, so they are smart enough to be taught how do those jobs. Not necessarily fair, but that’s the way it is. Obviously there are always exceptions, but I’d rather take my chances being the rule than the exception.</p>
<p>Caillebotte makes some important points. On the one hand you have these total bullsh1t majors that don’t do anything for you without a really good plan prior to college, and on the other hand you have degrees like biology, chemistry where you need a further degree to really get anywhere. I’d choose the latter, but that’s just me.</p>