<p>I'm going to be a senior in the fall and I am thinking really hard what kind of major I should pick. Engineering is one major, and through my research I found out that as an engineering major the first 2 years of college you take a bunch of foundation general courses, and then last 2 years you start focusing on your major and apply your technical skills.</p>
<p>What I'm worried about being an engineer (and any other major) is that what if the classes are real interesting in the beginning but then you start to dislike them up to the point where you want to switch out? I don't want this situation to happen.</p>
<p>A lot of people I know and have read about say that they often stumble upon their career by taking an intro course. Is this a good indicator of your major, if you really like the intro courses? What if the advanced courses are nothing like you imagined them to be? </p>
<p>Can anyone offer advice on this and whether a great interest in a 101 course is a good indicator that you will TRULY like the major? </p>
<p>I think you’ll get a pretty good idea of your upper div courses through those intro ones. For me, I learned within my first year that I didn’t want to do ME and switched to BME instead. Finishing up my third year, it was a great decision. The nice thing about engineering, at least from my experience, is that each discipline shares many of the same intro courses so switching majors within the department shouldn’t set you back too much (if you do it during your first or beginning of second year).</p>
<p>Yeah, if you don’t like the specific type of engineering you initially set out for you can generally transfer to another early on without too much hassle. At VT you can’t even pick a specific engineering discipline until your sophomore year, though if you’re going to do computer engineering you take a different intro to engineering class than other engineers. As far as switching out of engineering altogether, if you’re switching into something like business or a science it should be a fairly painless transfer, since a lot of the first year or so would be similar.</p>
<p>As far as whether liking a 101 means anything, I don’t really think so. I’ve loved a lot of 1000 level classes in majors I know I’d hate, and I didn’t really like the first in major class I took.</p>
<p>What makes you think you might want to be an engineer?</p>
<p>I guess the best thing would be to take an open mind to college. Don’t rule out anything, keep all of your options open. Perhaps try and find a college where it won’t be difficult to change your major in semster or two.</p>
<p>You will quickly realize what subjects you hate and which you like. Try and take as many classes as you can. I did - I entered as a Chemsitry major, then moved into Electrical Engineering and then ended up in mechancial engineering. I lost over 15 hours of classes, however, at the end of the day, its been worth it. I couldn’t pick a major by just reading about it. I had to actually take classes to decide.</p>
<p>and I’m going to take to heart all your guys’ advices. And I think your right in that you just trust yourself when a certain class is or is not for you. And I think your right in that you really don’t know until you take the class</p>
<p>I’m thinking if I should just apply to engineering school as an undecided engineering major. But going into college picking one sounds like a good idea too.</p>
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<p>I’m good at math and science and I don’t hate it, but it isn’t something that makes me get all excited either. But engineering is one of the best fields to get a good job and make money and I also read that a lot of non-engineering majors don’t have the technical skills employers want so engineering majors are really marketable.</p>
<p>I also thought about medical field, but I don’t like hospitals and I don’t want to study in school 10 years. Also, since biomedical engineering is one way to head into medical research, going into engineering gives me a lot of room to think about I should do.</p>