I’m 25 right now attending university, expecting to graduate in two years in the path I am at now. Since before I started high school leading to my first year of college I’ve wanted to work in broadcasting and as such started my first year majoring in communications. The next year however I decided to change to computer science after being influenced by my parents and realizing how competitive the broadcasting field is and how many people have had problems finding jobs. For a time I enjoyed taking classes (I’ve mostly took IT and networking courses), however in the last year I’ve had second thoughts about it and considered going back to broadcasting. After going into the deeper core classes I’ve realized that I really don’t have enough knowledge in the CS field, especially programming, in order for me to succeed in this field. I’ve performed much better in HS and my early years of college taking communications/radio/TV courses and really think I’ll be much happier working in this field, plus I’m much more knowledgeable having following this kind of stuff since as long as I can remember. What is your insight on this? Is it worth taking the career change or am I too old for it by now?
Well, first of all, if you just started taking computer science courses of course you don’t have enough knowledge yet to succeed - and that’s okay. You’re still majoring in it, studying and learning. Even in two years when you graduate, you won’t learn everything; most things you will learn on the job through experience and continuing training. You have the opportunity to learn more programming and more languages over time. So if you’d said you wanted to be a software developer or computer scientist, I’d say the fact that you didn’t start learning this in HS is totally okay - keep pushing.
However, the important part is that you said you’ll be happier trying to work in communications. And that’s more important.
People around you are always going to try to steer you from things they perceive as riskier and less rewarding to things they think are safer and more remunerative. Computer science is the “in-fashion” field these days - it’s respected and most people know that software developers have the potential to make lots of money, so everyone’s parents are trying to steer them into this career now. But it’s not right for everyone!
On the other hand - yes, there is a level of risk inherent in competitive fields like broadcasting or TV. But only you can decide how comfortable you are with taking that risk. The other thing is that there are things you can do to mitigate that - develop skills, get internships, earn experience. Maybe you don’t make it as an anchor but you end up doing research for a nightly news show or working on the production team or as a technical communicator or something else. There are lots of jobs in communications that are more behind-the-scenes - and pretty much all industries need good communicators in a variety of roles.
So if communications is what you’re really into, follow that!