Let me preface this by saying I am a first year college student, but I brought in all the social science and humanities credits I would have to take from AP’s; so instead of leaving in May 2022, I’ll be leaving in December 2021.
Here’s some background on me.
When I was a kid, I would spend the entire summers outside playing in the lake either swimming, fishing, or boating. Naturally, I developed a curiosity as to how the world around me functioned. I’d torture my parents with questions like how did the fish survive when the lake froze or what mechanisms kept the water in the lake fresh and clean? When I turned 12, I fell really ill with a thyroid condition, so whenever I had extra time on my hands, I would research the science behind my condition. I really wanted to understand why my immune system misfired and attacked an organ. The doctors were pretty baffled by a 12 year old who’d question the hell out of them. The following school year, 7th grade, my science course taught genetics for the first time and I was hooked.
I took all three years of biology in my high school, flew threw them all, and barely put any effort in to do it. I still loved all three years of it and felt very engaged.
Also during my childhood, my parents would always keep the news on and my dad would tell me about historical figures. I know a lot of people may think it rooted from him, but eventually I would turn on the news on my own and talk to people about what I saw on there. This interest followed me through my pre-teens, teens, and all the way up till now. My views have shifted greatly from the time I was 12, but I still enjoy keeping up on politics. I never liked taking history courses in school though because the teachers sugarcoated them so much, we’d barely be learning history anymore.
Whenever I picked courses in high school, I always just picked all STEM options. I just always thought I would become a biologist because I am painfully shy, so I couldn’t see politics working in real life. Then, around senior year, I discovered how tough a path to that would actually be and how little money that would lead to. So when college apps rolled around, I searched for schools that taught bioengineering. (Since I was good at Calculus and Physics in school, I thought maybe engineering?)
I know you guys may say, bioengineering is a terrible major. Well, I found a school that offered a slightly different version of it named “Biosystems Engineering.” Out of 220 graduates in 2016, 88% of them were in a job/grad school in 6 months and the average starting salary was $61,000. BE is slightly different than BME, in that BE grads can work in medicine or agriculture.
I took an engineering course during my 10th grade year and I HATED everything about it. I didn’t like building, coding, drafting, the reports, or any of it. I just thought, that was a long time ago, maybe this time would be different. IT WASN’T AT ALL. My intro to BE class was based around having students talk to alumni. Every week, we’d listen to 4 people talk about their jobs. I just could not see myself doing any of them, none of them even remotely sparked my interests. I began reaching out to professors and career counselors. They all expressed to me that if I wanted to work with my hands, be physically active, and directly apply scientific principles I was learning, then I was in the wrong place.
So I switched my major to Microbiology in December and honestly I am terrified. Most people in my major just use this as jumping point to medical school, but I really don’t have any drive in me to be a doctor. The idea of helping/treating people does not appeal to me at all. The idea of going into academia also is really off putting to me. I’d rather get a job after a BS/MS and be done. (Unless I suddenly find some extreme passion.) The issue with that is that bio majors make terrible money. I know money isn’t everything, and I’m not looking to be rich, but at the end of the day I need to be able to save for retirement, pay off loans, a house, cars, and other bills. I’d also like to travel and have a boat.
Since I’ve last posted to CC, I’ve discovered a few things. I really do not like statistics. I am in a stats course for scientists, calculus is a pre-req, and I could care less about it. I dread going to class and the homework is a chore. Also, I can’t write a line of code to save my life. I spend hours doing coding assignments, getting help from others, and staring at the directions in complete confusion. I am not improving at all at this despite my best efforts. I haven’t been able to write 1 line of code without getting an error this semester. I’ve been trying to learn coding in R for my stats class, so this is the language I’ve been struggling in. So that knocks out bioinformatics, biotech, and biostats/public health.
I just feel so stuck right now. I don’t think I can take time off of school, because I am fairly positive my mom would kick me out and cut me off. I am the one who’s paying for college, but I do not have the means to live on my own during the summers, and I need her to cosign on loans. I do have a part time job, but I don’t have a lot of time to work it. I spend 12 hours a week in 2 of my lab courses alone. Can’t drop below full time because that would mess up financial aid.
I know your major doesn’t strictly determine your career path, but I want to work in science. I don’t want to be the bio grad that ends up in marketing or finance.
I am the type of person who needs to have a plan for everything. This literally gives me a lot of anxiety not having any idea what I am going to do. I change my mind between agriculture, food/drug law, and pharmaceuticals on the daily.