Ucbalumnus, I agree totally. I was responding to another post that stated such kids would want ivys. I wasn’t trying to be picky by not including Cornell or Princeton for engineering, just making a general statement.
I was thinking about the CS and engineering students I know, and what where their target schools.
This should really start in kindergarten and elementary school. If you are coming to college and doing this, its a bit late.
It’s still possible to figure it out when you’re in college, but you might run into some bumps in the road. I know somebody who lived in a group home while in high school. His HS experience was basically independent study. He had, like, zero study skills when first starting community college. Flunked a few classes in community college, had to retake them. Eventually transferred to a 4 yr college and graduated with a BS in electrical engineering.
Not always. DH was the quintessential “late bloomer.” He has said many times that he never studied in High School nor in college until around Junior year of college when he realized that he needed to buckle down.
He began studying, graduated college, went on to business school and ultimately became very successful both in terms of being passionate about his career and reaping financial reward.
He is so very disciplined now that I cannot imagine him as a slacker. He also says that he would enjoy to returning to school in retirement. His love of learning — though developed rather late — did stick for him.
This is so different from the way that I was as a young person, but knowing DH’s backstory helped me ease up a bit on our kids.
I know other late bloomers as well. One of the smartest students in my law school class told me a similar story to DH. Experienced a complete turnaround in college and was off and running.
College is a time for personal growth and can be transformative (these years also align with brain development in the pre-frontal cortex).
For us, the overarching theme that we’ve tried to communicate to our 2 kids is how to go through the decision making process of figuring out what field, major, etc. is right for you. For example:
We’ve also recommended to our 2 DDs that they consider NOT going into a career that historically has been a female-dominated profession.
I didn’t suggest any particular degree but DS24 wanted to study medicine(had to choose a pathway in HS) and knowing him, I explained the time & effort it takes to become a Doctor and he dropped that track and chose Engineering.
I believe we need to provide information to kids so they can make an informed decision.
I don’t see this as something that is taught directly (or indirectly) in the schools I’ve seen (limited sample but my kids attended among the better public schools in Massachusetts and several highly regarded private schools). The best of the private schools may have done some of this as it had year-long themes that animated segments of the teaching across subjects, but I’m not sure.
I signed my kids up for a lottery to get into a charter high school that was project oriented and promoted kids in each subject based upon mastery. A lot of that was self-learning. They didn’t get in until things were well set up elsewhere (my gifted seriously dyslexic kid was being treated very well by his high school – the Deputy Superintendent of Schools had observed how off the charts bright he was and how much effort he was putting in and had taken an interest in him and had overridden some “by the books”) so I thought it was too late to switch.
I did say that. I doubt that it is hard to get a tech job for STEM kids in Toronto – I just talked to a couple kids who went to Waterloo and are working in Toronto.
@ucbalumnus, it may not just be kids who couldn’t be elite in the US but who could but prefer the quality of life in Canada. We also have Canadian relatives who did their graduate work and/or post-docs at Harvard and MIT and Carnegie-Mellon and then took jobs in Canada that were less prestigious than they could have gotten in the US but did so because they want to live in and raise kids in Canada (i.e., for the quality of life). Their colleagues are not of the same caliber as they would have had in the US. The challenges may not be as great. But, I have never heard them say they regret the choices – although one who is a prof at one of the major Canadian universities does lament that he is not well paid.
My son has incredible musical talent (perfect pitch both ways, is a pianist and drummer) and is quite gifted with writing “beats” and original instrumental computer-generated music.
He thought he wanted to major in music production but then we visited a top school and he talked to a lot of students as well as a friend who tried to make it in the business. The truth is a degree in that field is rather useless now as with computers many can leapfrog into success through online streaming platforms. The industry has changed dramatically away from traditional studios. Since he’s very good with computers I suggested he major in comp sci with an emphasis in security and do his music as a side hobby. He’s doing a great summer internship with a top company and he’ll be graduating next year.
As far as music? He and a co-producer friend have started an LLC where they write instrumental ad music for sports marketing and other companies. They’ve had consistent success and have done music for a number of companies. This week a song was used by Apple at their Wordwide Developer’s Conference for their daily videos. But even then the money isn’t anything you could live on (more like part-time job money)and it’s the kind of business that is unpredictable. He is so glad he chose a more secure major and I am glad I suggested it.
Inspired by this thread, I made a list of the majors of the young adults I know who have graduated recently. All were from two college educated parent families, from three different geographic regions, and most from outside my work circle, which probably contributes to the dearth of STEM majors. It’s a very small sample size (~15) but I was actually quite surprised by the variety.
Their majors included the popular Biology (an unsuccessful pre-med), Economics, and Psychology, but also some not often mentioned on CC, such as Anthropology, Urban Studies, and Geography. All but the two who just graduated in May have jobs they like with career potential, most not directly related to their majors. They are early in their careers, so hard to predict how things will develop.
There is also one who (much to her parents’ chagrin) skipped college and joined the military, and three who will most likely never be college graduates or even self-supporting due to serious mental illness. This probably deserves a thread of its own.
More anecdata, FWIW…
Academic music (not just the industry) is changing as well! More diversity in curriculum, more access for kids who did not have the privilege of conservatory prep etc. , more respect for digital audio work station projects, and for music for new media. There is still some disdain among non-commercial composers, both faculty and students, but many of those composers are facing issues with getting a job post-grad, regardless of level of degree. Faculty jobs are in short supply.
Your son made a choice frequently advocated for on the music forum (often by me) and I give that counsel whether traditional classical composer or someone in some aspect of music tech. Your son probably could have continued in music if he wanted to, even with the CS major. His path gave him the most flexibility I think.
Sounds like composers have even more difficult prospects than performers (who have it hard enough).
There are basically three positions:
But there is also the subtopic about what majors or career paths are more or less likely to lead to good outcomes (with varying definitions of “good outcomes”). A significant point of disagreement that results in posters talking past each other is the primacy of anecdotes versus data. For most people in general, anecdotes overrule data (“seeing is believing”), even if the anecdotes happen to be outliers when the full set of data is considered.
Yes, the conversation has moved but I think it’s a good direction because there are so many nuances to this.
The last part of your post is interesting to me.
We as parents often rely on anecdotes instead of hard data (not sure that data exists) as to how best to inform our kids.
A lot of this information we impart to our kids is very general and maybe not even as helpful as we think.
Love this.
We also have not ever spoken our kids about non-profit work. Not because we are against it, but because no one in the family (either side) has ever done it. I think our kids received the subtle message you work for pay and you volunteer and give back with time and money. We’ve always pretty active in the community but our work and volunteering don’t mix. I know some families have a very different ethos.
I know that lots of my college friends went into fields where they planned to have a huge impact on the world. Those jobs generally paid far less. Some stayed. Most changed fields after they got married/had families.
Let me pick a nit here :-). People go by what outcomes seem plausible for their kids as opposed to nationwide averages for particular majors, careers, wlb etc.
You look at averages if you are not sufficiently informed and are going into the field for the first time. If you have sufficiently fine grained view of your own situation, or gather data that is more applicable to you, then you ignore the averages. For example, when it comes to a career in music, I will go by averages. When it comes to a career in particular parts of finance or tech, we don’t care about the averages. We are looking at particular companies we care about, the odds of getting an interview/ job there etc.
Yeah, good point. If you know a field well, you can ignore all the averages. Meaningless.
And I’m not sure how data would really help in a general way. My kids went to an elite private high school (on scholarship). Students there have a lot of connections because of their parents. They can pick whatever major they want and never have a problem with getting a good internship or job because their parents help them. My kids don’t have that advantage and my son had to work very hard to get the internship he ended up with. So a student with wealth-privilege could major in Biology and still land a good job post-graduation while a non-wealthy student from a generic state school could have the same major and never get a job. I sort of straddle two economic circles of acquaintances and the differences in outcomes is startling.
Funny. My D is older but one of her childhood friends who is among the most successful professionally is a singer-songwriter who majored in music production.
I thought she was going to be a pop star. She has the talent and the looks and an early success made it seem that she could make it. But…she got a degree in music production and ran a recording studio. She must be good because lots of top talent work with her. That segued into the music part of the movie/TV business. She is a vocal arranger, a music producer, a singer and songwriter.
She has written about 700 songs that are in TV shows or movies, usually B grade movies, but some A grade. Some are geared towards kids. If you have a grandchild, it’s extremely likely that you’ve heard songs she has written and heard her sing. She also is one of the co-writers of a song written to celebrate the anniversary of a major American corporation.
One thing I got a chuckle out of is that one of the TV shows for kids she wrote music for is written by an elementary school classmate.
Yes, it’s just one anecdote but just proof some people do make it.
This is @neela1 's point which I agree with but also doesn’t contradict the fact that people are often over reliant on anecdata.