Let’s just hope people are listening to at least two points of view(one on either side) and making decision on the basis of the facts provided. This used to be the job of good journalists. No longer.
Today, I was looking for a news story ( with a scientific basis). I could not find a single article that talked about the point (who had excavated the bones). Instead it was all political. And it was about the sale of a dinosaur. Everything has been politicized.
That may not be sufficient if those two points of view are extreme and diametrical opposites.
Back to the topic of this thread, a college is a place to learn a set of skills, including the general ability to reason and to question the basis of any result or conclusion. A belief, even if it’s held by a vast majority, is still just a belief. A statistical result is only as good as the conditions under which it was sampled. A historical example is just that, not a prediction of the future.
Has anyone on the thread suggested kids seek a dual major in order to meet their interests and still offer a better paying route? I’ve had many friends do this rather than suggest kids take the lower paying road or the higher paying thing that interests them less.
Would love to hear if that was a way to hit both marks.
That’s frequently part of the discussion for those doing dance and other fine arts where the chances of a performance career are limited. It’s also often a consideration in where to pick (some colleges make it much easier than others) and what degree to take (BFA vs BA vs minor).
But I think it’s usually more about having a backup plan than seeking an alternative that pays more. And it may be hard if not impossible to combine particularly long majors like engineering or CS with a BFA, so then those high paying careers may not be a realistic option.
The student needs to have some interest and ability in the higher paying route in order to be good enough at it to be employable in it.
A double major can increase the risk of needing extra semesters of school, if the majors (and general education not overlapping with the majors) have high volumes of requirements, and/or the student does not plan schedules well.
It is somewhat common on these forums for posters to advise premeds to consider their non-medical-school backup plans when choosing their undergraduate majors, although this is not a double major per se (pre-med courses are not a major).
Interesting. My mother was a theater and art major ( went to two schools undergrad), so I’m somewhat familiar with the arts or bust idea. But, I wonder if some students haven’t been more pragmatic given the chance in these arts fields. For example, my mom became a drama teacher and art teacher. Dance is perhaps even more difficult given the physical component. You know you won’t be a dancer in a major ballet company at 55. So are plans made for later?
Well that is true in every case. With so many majors surely they can find something that interests them in?
That makes me wonder if there’s a question of how flexible are people in their choice of major? Will they adjust in order to get a job, or will they only do the major they want even if they can’t make a living doing it? And do the parents ( if they are paying for the education) merely suggest, or do they guide or are they totally hands off?
My D always planned to do a double major with her ballet BFA. She started off thinking math was a possibility but ended up doing environmental studies, which is obviously less likely to lead to high paying jobs. I think a key factor was that the level of effort required to complete a double degree in four years (~22 units per semester for most of that time) is hard to sustain unless you are really interested in the subject.
And even now she’s somewhat burnt out with school and would be reluctant to consider going back for a masters at the end of a dance career in order to gain a qualification in something more lucrative. Maybe that will change in a year or two, but you can also see how it’s easy to end up by default in low paying related careers (eg teaching dance) unless you make a definitive decision at graduation that you are done with dance.
I have suggested a variation of that to 1 of my kids. She’s a history buff but doesn’t want to do anything history-related as a career. She’s a computer kid, too, so she might major in MIS and minor in history.
Very much agree with this statement.
Has she also considered econ? History and economics go well together. Not to mention that econ is a very flexible degree. Lots of skills within it. MIS is a good one too. So is anything having to do with big data if she’s open to that. She could work in a history dept crunching data for research 
I haven’t been able to read every comment, but it seems like that’s okay as it went a bit sideways there…
Have I ever suggested my kids seek degrees that would offer better-paying jobs? Short answer, no.
Longer answer:
I will start that I’m saying this from a place of privilege. We are paying for both kids to attend college, they’ve had many resources available to them and they have a strong enough foundation that they are in a “good place” in terms of mental health, varied experiences and self advocacy. They have seen their father work in a job that pays a lot of money, but he isn’t passionate about and they have seen their mother work in a low paying job that she is passionate about. Neither parent grew up with a lot of money and the kids are well versed in New England Puritan frugalness.
My theory has always been if someone (in this case my kids) wants something enough, and has adequate resources, they will find a way to make it work. As I said, my kids have enough resources that, if they want it, they will figure it out. Decide not to sign up for calc your senior year and then realize you want to be an engineer? Figure out how to either make a schedule change, sign up for a summer class, or take one at the community college. Major in a low paying field? Learn to live on less, how to monetize your other skills or go back to school.
Nothing in their lives is set and permanent. They might just be on a different schedule or have different desires than the ones I’ve arbitrarily subscribed to. I was never a helicopter parent and it’s paid off in my kids’ ability to get things done on their own. I now have to trust them to continue to make their own decisions. We started the process early enough that I’ve seen them do it and I believe in them.
S23 was all in on applying to engineering schools for a while. He did an internship in wildlife bio and decided that he would be miserable as an engineer and happy as a biologist. He understands the difference in earning potential and was even smart enough to check out how the wildlife biologists that he was working with lived on a salary that was a fraction of what most engineers make. He could see himself being very happy in their shoes.
D22 is majoring in early childhood education. She has been working at a childcare center for a couple of years and realizes that all of her coworkers have 2nd jobs. She is getting a degree that will allow her to work k-2 and make more money than teaching preschool, however, at this point, she really wants to teach “littles”. She has decided she’d rather teach in preschool and waitress than work in a public school but her degree will allow her to work in a higher paying (although not by much) environment if she chooses. Let’s be real, she’ll still likely have to work a second job.
We are thrilled for both of them. I’d rather have them know how to be happy. And if they want to go into a higher paying job, they’ll figure it out. There are many pathways to get to any one job and there are multiple jobs one can do from any major. In terms of ROI, D22 picked an economical state school and S23 is looking at lower cost OOS large state flagships where he can change majors as he figures things out and have opportunities for research. He will likely get a lot of merit. We did not push either of them in this direction, but it shows us that even though we are paying for it, they understand the value of a dollar.
I think they’ll do just fine.
I have suggested the dual major thing to others. With my son, he decided as a first semester freshman that he was interested in behavioral econ. I suggested that he take a math course every semester because a) it didn’t require reading (and he is dyslexic); b) if he wanted to go to grad school in econ, grad departments care more about how good you are in math than how you did in undergrad econ courses; and c) I had a guess he would be very good at more advanced math (my observation of him combined with his genetics). So he was a triple major in math/econ/psych.
@Htas, with other kids, I have often suggested the quant side of social science to go along with a humanities interests or Arabic for those interested in and good at languages.
I met my ShawWife when she was in art school and she was pursuing both an arts degree and an art education degree. I suggested to her, as I may have mentioned above, that she try to make it as an artist and, if that didn’t work, to do something else that used her creative energy rather than teach. I think she would have designed products as an entrepreneur – she’s very visually creative and went part way down the road with a very clever handbag company and got Neiman Marcus to make a big order and then realized she would need a real business partner to manage the business and not another artist who also wanted to be creative.
But what if the student is only interested in and has some ability in areas that mostly lead to lower paying careers (and is not elite enough in those subjects to get into the higher paying career paths associated with those subjects)?
For example, if the student’s strengths are in arts, English, and biology, but the student is merely good (not elite) in those subjects, how much would it help career-wise to have more than one major among those subjects?
It may depend on how different the “careerist” major or course selection is compared to the “pure academic interest” major or course selection is, or whether the student can do both easily. For example, a student into pure math may find is not too difficult to add a few electives in applied math, statistics, computer science, finance, and/or economics in order to open up additional career directions.
Of course, the above assumes that the student chooses a major or courses mostly out of “pure academic interest”. Actual choices of majors by college students overall suggest that “careerist” motivations are a significant factor for most college students – overtly pre-professional majors (e.g. business, health professions, engineering, etc.) make up more BA/BS degrees than liberal arts majors (and some students choose liberal arts majors for pre-professional reasons, like economics as a substitute business major (pre-Wall-Street at prestige private colleges), or political science that many seem to believe is the go-to pre-law major, or biology that many seem to believe is the go-to pre-med major). The rise of the popularity of the CS major over the last decade is another example, in comparison to two decades ago when far fewer chose CS in the wake of the early 2000s crash.
Contrary to popular belief around these forums*, calculus in high school is not necessary for engineering majors at most colleges, although a strong knowledge of precalculus math is necessary to start off in calculus 1 that most engineering course plans list for first semester frosh.
*Probably due to the focus on highly selective colleges, which make most of the few colleges that actually do require or prefer calculus in high school for engineering majors, or where admission is competitive enough that having opted out of calculus in high school when available to the student is seen as a negative.
Looks like both of them are well aware of the career path implications of their majors and the pay / income implications of their career paths, and do not appear to have spending habits that are unlikely to be sustainable on those income levels. I.e. they have made well informed choices that are doable. This does not seem like a situation where parental suggestions otherwise would be indicated.
On the other hand, a student with spendy habits who chooses biology as a major at a college that requires substantial loans under the mistaken impression that all STEM majors get paid a lot may need some guidance on what is realistic.
Speaking of supply chain, and students being smart about getting an education on the cheap…
We have a friend whose daughter was accepted by Purdue for supply chain management. She helped her mom run the family’s hair salon, and took her intro classes at Harper College, while living at home and working. She then finished her last two years at Purdue who conferred her degree. She saved a fortune.
My dad used to say, “Many people love what they do, but don’t make a good living. Many people hate what they do, but make a great living. Very few love what they do and make a great living.”
I’d also add that if that’s the first time you’re having that conversation, there were probably a bunch of other conversations you could have had earlier. I feel like we’ve had conversations around the dinner table since they were little about careers, spending habits, weighing your options, choices and their consequences, lifestyles, etc. All of that, along with opportunities to make mistakes and recover from them led them to be able to make the well thought out decisions that we, as parents, can respect.
That’s a nice anecdote, but of the “many” who supposedly make a great living (however that is defined), do you really believe that only a small minority love their job? I’d expect that the further up the income scale you go, the greater the proportion of people who love their job. Billionaires aren’t working at jobs they hate.
There still are very few billionaires.