Following Your Passions vs. Career Considerations

Parents Forum
1

<p>I used to think that a "great education" and a "great career" used to go hand-in-hand but after completing my freshman year of college, I have become a cynic. In our competitive job markets today, it seems that only engineering students/economics majors are getting jobs right out of college while everyone else has to go to a professional program in order to be competitive(med, law, PhD program, etc.). The future doesn't look too bright for History/Political Science/English majors who want to join the job market right out of their undergraduate years.</p>

<p>This being said, should one opt to major in a subject that has a lot of future earning potential rather than something that he/she is actually interested in? I am just recently coming to terms with the idea that going to a top-notch college isn't a means to a high-paying job, but rather just a top-notch education. Those are two COMPLETELY DIFFERENT things. For instance, one can make the argument that an Art History or a Public Policy major is just as educated as a Mathematics or Economics major, but certainly the career/earning prospects for the various majors are very different. I currently am interested in majoring in History but I'm afraid that I won't get a good job out of college unless I major in Economics, even though people have claimed that what you major in isn't that important. My parents are paying 200k over 4 years for me to be financially independent and well-off. I know for a fact that "following through on my passions" and "acheiving a well-rounded education" is something they could care less about if it doesn't translate to me making 6 figures several years down the line.</p>

<p>I posted this one the Parents Forum because I want to get some feedback from the frame of reference of parents who are paying an exorbitant amount of money to send their kids to top colleges. As parents sending their kids to the top-tier schools, will you feel "let down" or "cheated" if your kids aren't doing very well financially immediately out of college even if they come out visibily more educated, mature and intelligent? Theoretically, the point of going to an Ivy or a similarily prestigious school is simply to receive a fantastic education, not neccessarily be catapulted into a more financially rewarding career as a result. Parents, if down the line you know friends of your kids who went to state schools that are making more money than your kid who went to an Ivy/top private, would you still feel like your choice to fund your kids' expensive college costs over those four years as "justifiable" if they were well-educated? Theoretically, as parents, you shouldn't be too upset over this outcome but reailty differs a lot from theory.</p>

<p>I would appreciate all your thoughts!!:)</p>

2

<p>
[quote]
I am just recently coming to terms with the idea that going to a top-notch college isn't a means to a high-paying job, but rather just a top-notch education. Those are two COMPLETELY DIFFERENT things.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Yes they are. </p>

<p>D is a Classics major at an Ivy, and is not planning on any sort of professional (i.e. MD, JD, MBA) degree later. I expect that she'll make very little money right out of college and if (as I suspect) she chooses to go to grad school and get an M.A. or Ph.D. later on, she probably still won't make much money. That doesn't bother me or my husband in the least. If she can eventually support herself doing something she loves, while having gotten a superb liberal arts education, that will be the best return on our investment we could hope for. We are not paying $200K so that she can be well-off (we could have paid much less if that were the only goal), but rather so that she can flourish, both intellectually and as a whole person, in a place for which she seems ideally suited. So far, it seems to be working. :)</p>

3

<p>I'm not shelling out big bucks as my son qualifies for FA.</p>

<p>As a parent, what I want for my children is for them to be happy and to be financially secure. My oldest values his intellectual life and his time, not his "stuff." He's going to major in one of those non-lucrative humanities. I'm thrilled for him. Education for education's sake is an end in itself in our eyes. He should be able to get a steady job that will meet his needs. I admit if I didn't think he could get permanent work, I'd be a bit nervous for him, but I still would think it is his life and his choice.</p>

<p>My pet peeve is reading posts from kids whose parents are pushing them into a lucrative or prestigious career, usually medicine, despite the fact the kids aren't interested in it. I think each person needs to decide for himself or herself what career path to pursue, taking into account what matters most to them.</p>

4

<p>I know I went a long time ago but it is not all that different as I have managed 4 children through the process. </p>

<p>The good liberal arts education is preparation for life. You are fully employable at entry level positions in many places if you can speak and write intelligently and are willing to look for them. They may not be your ideal if you were planning a career in your ideal field and you may not make as much as the technical fields but that is not the end of the story. </p>

<p>After settling in and using my skills for a few years, I went back and got the MBA which opened up a lot more lucrative opportunities. Could I have made more sooner starting on a business path, maybe, but it isn't an either or choice. It's a step along the path. You don't know where the next step will take you. But you are only given one time along the path and it is not worth being miserable along the way. .</p>

<p>Of course the discussion should occur before all are committed to an expensive option so parents and students are in agreement</p>

5

<p>My college sophomore and HS senior are not majoring in any of the "big bucks" categories for their college educations. And, although I want them to be financially secure later, that is fine with me. What I want for them out of college is four years of education where they learn about themselves and the world around them by studying various subjects from people of all backgrounds. I spent all of their high school years assuring them that they could truly indulge their intellect and creativity once they reached college and that is what I encourage them to do. I admire those young people who just "know" they want to major in marketing or engineering or whatever, but my kids are not like that. They are unlikely to be planning how to get into a good graduate school or snagging the "best" internships. I do not encourage them to be resume building for four years. I want them to follow their intellectual passions and let the chips fall where they may. And, so far, by doing just that, my older son gets a lot of great feedback from professors who admire his love of learning. As long as they learn and move forward, then I am happy.</p>

6

<p>"It is not worth being miserable along the way" - I whole heartedly agree. After being in the "workforce" for over 30 years, I can say that everyone at one time or another wonders "what if". Some will even stop and start over. However, to not even start down life's path doing something one enjoys means that you spend really wonderful early adult hood unhappy and that I would never hope for my children.</p>

7

<p>I agree with Momof3. With immigrant parents, and as a community college transfer, I didn't have the luxury or time of finding my passion. And, I was definitely not one of those driven kids who had a definitive plan---going to dental or medical school. It was a matter of completing my college degree, finding a job, and start supporting myself. My job has been the means for my children to pursue THEIR passions...that has become my legacy to them.</p>

8

<p>You don't want to pursue a field you have no interest in but for most of us, we still want a reasonably financially rewarding career. Even if you like a particular field, you could end up dissatisfied if you end up not earning enough to be financially secure. Of course conversely, you could enter a financially rewarding field yet end up dissatisfied because you hate doing it. The best choice of course for most is to do both - find a financially rewarding field that you also find interesting.</p>

<p>I don't think it's wise for most people to 'blindly' follow some idea of an interest just because they find it somewhat interesting. I think college students 'should' consider 'what happens next?'. However, they shouldn't generalize too much either and conclude that only the doctors, lawyers, engineers, IB, etc. are earning the big salaries. They should have their eyes open though and realize when their chosen major and path might have a more difficult time finding a lucrative entry-level job.</p>

<p>Knowledge is power. If you have no interest in grad school and want a job with a history degree, check with the career counseling department at your school and do other research to find out what opportunities are out there. Try to figure out what you'd be interested in doing and where you see yourself immediately after graduation, 5, 10, and 15 years from now. Find out where grads from your school with history degrees typically end up. Find out what companies recruit at your school and what majors they're interested in and focus on those who hire history majors into entry-level positions, what they pay, and what the future prospects are.</p>

9

<p>I went to college and majored in something that would get me a job. </p>

<p>I do not recommend that path.</p>

<p>I got a job immediately after finishing school in a completely different field for which my major qualification was eight (!) college credits in that field. Kind of wish I'd taken courses in that field before I was a senior, because I quite liked it and would have changed my major if I hadn't been almost done with school.</p>

<p>Most of the people I know have careers that are not in their college field of study. A history major friend works for the Library of Congress, another history major friend went back to school after some years in the workforce and became a special-ed teacher, while raising a multiple-handicapped child. </p>

<p>You have many opportunities in life to get a job, but precious few opportunities to spend four years solely on getting a college education. Learn what you love.</p>

10

<p>Evil Asian: "200k over 4 years for me to be financially independent and well-off". Very few and I repeat very few grads are "well-off" right out of college regardless of what college or university they go to. If you research the statistics the vast majority start in the $30 to $50,000 range with engineers toward the top and the generalists at the bottom and all salaries dependent on the size and name recognition of the company. The "well-off" part typically comes later - and is more dependent on the individual than the college or university. 6 figures is a lofty goal, attainable but lofty and few "hit that" quickly even from "Ivies"...for instance we recruit at Georgia Tech, U of M, RPI and others...and even lowly Michigan Tech in the middle of nowhere and the pay scales are not different for entry level jobs. Same with recruiting for the finance group...the college does not differentiate the starting pay scale. I'm referring primarily to a BA/BS with no job experience except maybe an internship or simillar. UCSD dad gives good advice, hopefully along the path you'll have some idea of where you want to go...what industry you're interested in, what "type" of job you're going after for example an English major could head for publishing, communications, human resources, or a dozen different industries. A poli sci major could move toward government, toward politics, toward foreign service...or whatever. Different parts of the country and different parts of the world have different pay scales..as does the cost of living. Different colleges are "known" for producing good grads in different areas and those differences sometimes have not alot to do with the magazine rankings (think Michigan Tech or journalism students from Missouri). There are so many variables that are far more important than the X amount of dollars went toward this BA/BS stuff.</p>

11

<p>
[quote]
will you feel "let down" or "cheated" if your kids aren't doing very well financially immediately out of college even if they come out visibily more educated, mature and intelligent?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>No.<br>
.</p>

12

<p>I suspect that if you questioned them closely, even your parents would say that what they want is for you to be happy, productive, and engaged with the world, not just rich, and they certainly don't want you to be rich and miserable. Many people who have undergone real economic privation, and who have made sacrifices for their children, may feel that it's hard to be fulfilled if you are not financially secure, and there's something to that. But "financial security" means different things to different people, and lots of people love their lives without ever making six figures. That doesn't mean they are starving. It means they have adjusted their lifestyles to their income, and they are doing things that make them feel like good people.</p>

<p>Interestingly enough, many people I have known like that HAVE eventually achieved conventional economic success. When you are doing what you love, and you are good at it and understand it, often great opportunities come your way, or you figure out how to create them. The other day, I met half of a couple who own a fabulous store and import business. They started as high school teachers, and more or less fell into importing as a sideline. They have become sophisticated business people -- and they are very rich -- but that was never their goal.</p>

<p>In my family, the one of us who is most financially successful (by several orders of magnitude) is the one who did the least well in college, and struggled to get a B average as a Spanish major . . . having abandoned Geology after the third time she dropped Physics. But she was a nice person, she got a job, she learned it, she worked hard, she kept getting the next job, and one day she was the kind of person about whom you read in Barron's or Business Week. (Oh . . . and by the way, she's not very happy, but her unhappiness has nothing to do with her job or her wealth, both of which she loves. She -- and her parents -- would trade her wealth for happiness without a second thought if she could.)</p>

13

<p>Thanks for all the great anecdotes and information!!:)</p>

14

<p>evil asian dictator:</p>

<p>I'm going to take a slightly different tack here. I don't want to be thrown in with the moneyisallthatmatters crowd, but I want to suggest that there may be a way to have your cake and eat it too. My first time through undergraduate life, I majored in history. Toward the end of that degree, I came to the conclusion that it would have been a good idea to study a lot more economics as an adjunct to the study of history--not for future employment purposes, but because the skill-set and mindset of economics (NOT business-type economics) makes for better historians. My suggestion is to consider pursuing a double major in history and economics; if you are just finishing your freshman year, and have a decent math background, this should be doable. </p>

<p>Disclosure time: my H is an economics professor with a great interest in history (although the history aspect does not come into play in his professional research). His best students are not pre-business types, but intellectual students with well-developed analytical skills who look forward to a wide variety of occupations--writers/journalist, non-profit administration, government service, law school eventually, etc. </p>

<p>The parental view: my son is a computer science and math major (with a humanities major thrown in for fun), who is basically paying his own way through college with a whopping merit scholarship, so we don't have to face this question with him. Our daughter, a rising high school junior, may well want to major in something less specifically career-oriented down the road. I thought my H might be getting ready to be a pill about this subject, but recently pronounced that she could major in anything she wanted to, and he would gladly pay to send her to any school that promised to give her a good education. And that is as it should be.</p>

15

<p>Given that the costs of college have largely outstripped inflation over the years, it makes sense to take a more practical approach towards education than ever before. </p>

<p>With this in mind, my views are: </p>

<ol>
<li><p>Don't go into sizable debt for a liberal arts education today, although one could argue that it makes sense financially with respect to the very best schools, where employers give job offers to liberal arts students because of the social network and the school filters out for the employers the very bright. </p></li>
<li><p>Corollary to item #1 - don't even think about going into debt in the fine arts or theatre fields - that to me is clearly insane - if parents can easily pay, then great, but otherwise, it makes no sense. </p></li>
<li><p>History, Anthropology, English (at least what used to get taught as English before the Modernists took over) etc., and the like are great majors and truly enhance critical thinking skills - and pay off in the long run. Many top schools permit double majoring - and it majoring in a practical field - which is helpful to a job - and a liberal arts field can represent the best of both worlds. And it really helps in almost all graduate school endeavors. I did the same, and notice that in my free time today, I ravenously read a lot of history (my second, or softer, major). I make a good living and yet use my intellectual passion to enhance my life. </p></li>
<li><p>Being practical is not a sin. The only thing that cannot be easily stripped from anyone today is human capital - and developing it in a marketable area makes sense. My own bias is against kids who cannot become independent from their parents - my respect for young people that hover around their parents into their mid-20's and later - and their parents enabling - is very limited. An emphasis on independence and practical thinking early on won't hurt.</p></li>
</ol>

16

<p>"As parents sending their kids to the top-tier schools, will you feel "let down" or "cheated" if your kids aren't doing very well financially immediately out of college even if they come out visibily more educated, mature and intelligent?"</p>

<p>No, not at all (though I was an econ major and very employable, and dh went to med school, so we both did well financially). If my kids want to major in art history or classics or film or something else that isn't a ticket to six figures, more power to them. I firmly believe you have to do what you love, and the money will work itself out.</p>

17

<p>Amen to that, pizzagirl!</p>

<p>I wonder if there is any difference in our thoughts on these matters according to gender? Is there more pressure on boys to come out with bankable job skills?</p>

18

<p>
[quote]
I firmly believe you have to do what you love, and the money will work itself out.

[/quote]

This gets posted quite a bit on CC but I'm not convinced of it. I agree that if people love their field enough then the money might be less important to them but I don't think that money will always work itself out just because one is doing what they 'love'. Social workers and pre-school teachers might be doing what they love but might face financial challenges due to low pay.</p>

<p>And speaking of the phrase "doing what you love" - I think there are lots of students who don't necessarily 'love' any particular field. They might 'like' some fields but aren't necessarily passionate about any particular one. The advice for people like this at the less extreme end ('somewhat like' rather than 'passionately love') might be different.</p>

19

<p>I agree with your last paragraph. I really enjoy what I do but I could have easily gone into a whole bunch of different fields with an econ major and been happy at many of them. I think some people have very dedicated passions and others might enjoy intellectual stimulation from a whole host of different potential careers.</p>

20

<p>wow, where to start!</p>

<p>I'm going to make a couple of assumptions based on your moniker: You are Asian, either first or second generation.</p>

<p>This is not a trivial matter. Immigrants from Asia, Africa, some parts of South America, have a different view of what is necessary to secure a good chance for "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." -- and a well founded fear of abject poverty, unpredictable displacement, and social chaos.</p>

<p>So do many from the generation of americans that migrated from the Texas/Oklahoma area to California during the dust bowl years of the Depression. And so do many from the generation of Europeans that was displaced by WWII and landed on these fine shores. The values of those who started over from scratch is this country are part of the fabric of their fears and hopes for their children.</p>

<p>So, Evil Asian, your parents likely have a completely different view of the world than you do. Different fears especially. For them financial security is not a question of comfort, priide, or excess, but rather one of survival through the unpredictible turns of political, social and economic life.</p>

<p>Now, moving on from them, to you.</p>

<p>You were likely raised by them, as I was by parents born to recently relocated dust-bowl refugees, to view a quality college education, and the resultant placement into a position with a large corporation, as a guarantee of financial and emotional success. You now have come to realize this is likely not the case.</p>

<p>Contratulations on your matriculation to a Top 20 private school. The process of critically reanalyzing everything you were taught up to this point has begun. This is precisely the value of an elite education. You are learning to think for yourself. Bravo for you.</p>

<p>I cannot tell you how to live your life, or what you should value. You will wrestle with these choices over the next few years. Your elite education may lead you to a life of public service, religious vocation, teaching, accountancy, mid-level corporate position, or any number of professions and avocations that will pay for your bed, clothes, and bowl.</p>

<p>It may also lead you to Wall St, a prestigious law firm, or into the medical profession. Who knows? You don't yet, and I suggest you cannot yet. </p>

<p>I can offer this career advice -- the most financially successful people I know have started and run their own businesses. That... is the american dream.</p>

<p>Treat people well, devote yourself to pursuing things about which you are passionate and also skilled, and you will be 'successful' in whatever path you choose. That success may or may not allow a large house in the suburbs, but it will allow you to drift off to sleep each night with a feeling of satisfaction.</p>

<p>And I think your parents will be OK with that.</p>