<p>First of all welcome to the parents forum. I hope that your heart will heal and you take solace in the fact that your son wants to follow his passion which is a good thing. If he gets to the point that he wants to go to med school as others have mentioned, there are many roads that will take him there. </p>
<p>My D is currently a junior and freshman year it seemed that every couple of weeks she was going to major in something different as college courses were laid out like a big feast and she started tasting everything. With each "taste" she discovered something wonderful and "this" was the major. One week it was physics, then classics, then neuroscience, then government, history and now is a happy Religion major (took a course on the great migration and really got hooked). You should have been around my family to see the looks and hear the questions when she announced that. The main question that people asked her is "what are you going to do with a religion major?" Her response: anything I want. Has no inclination to go to seminary, become a minister or anything along those lines (plans on going to law school). She is currently doing a study abroad program in her major and just lights up when she talks about some of the discussions that take place in her classes. This makes me a very happy camper.</p>
<p>For what it is worth, my father was a successful surgeon and my brother and I were successful artists; both winning scholarships to well respected art schools. Unfortunately, dad wouldn't allow us to take them because he felt that "art was only a good hobby". Well, to make a long story short, brother and I went off to liberal arts colleges, became art majors, and are now very succesful physicians in the same town as dad. The only difference is that the years spent around other "non-science" majors allowed us to develop social skills, and a heart, that many of our science oriented classmates never figured out. Your son will be better off studying a passion and becoming a well rounded individual. Make sure he takes a few core "pre-med"courses for the heck of it. Who knows, he may find medicine the round-about way like many people do. My roommate was a math and economics major. Now he is an extremely well respected sports medicine surgeon in NYC. Bottom line is, if you do not enjoy doing what you do, what is the point of doing it?</p>
<p>Wow, what great responses. Yes, my post was tongue-in-beak, at least partially. But my worries:
1. I have several liberal arts major relatives that are/were grossly underemployed and not at all happy about it (Father:European History, career postal employee, sister: almost a masters in Art, "Foyer painter" (as in house painting, setting up scaffolding and painting walls), sister: Theater, secretarial pool.<br>
2. My son has already been psychowulvalizing me since he reached adolescense. Does he really have to take classes so he can improve his efforts in this area?<br>
3. I'm living my dreams through my son. Just ask him (see number 2)
4. He was the one kid I was going to be able to talk about his job with. Now what? Sigh. My older son went into IT and rolls his eyes at me a lot.
5. We always made fun of Liberal Arts majors when they ventured into our science/math classes. Anybody who makes fun of my baby will answer to ME.
OK, the positives:
1. He was BORN to counsel people - he's been doing this his whole life.
2. He is a big people-person/talker.
3. The other careers that are most in line with his talents would have been politician or used car salesman.
4. I really never could see him sitting alone for hours working on experiments as a scientist. I can't see him sitting for 3 minutes without talking.
5. A major with tons of reading is a good fit.
6. He could've gone into AGRICULTURE (our field.)
7. With the merit status, his BA/BS will probably be paid for (or close) and I understand Psychology grad school is usually paid one way or another. No med school tuition! Hooray!
8. Somebody will pay him to talk all day? No wonder this attracts him.
He's a sweet kid and hopefully will do well. I don't see him switching majors after he had to bite the bullet and tell his Dad he was going into Psychology.<br>
Hobofromdowntown - my husband IS Asian. Some tense days there, but he was actually OK with it before I settled down.
Thanks again for all the great responses. I feel better now.</p>
<p>Most kids change their major many, many times. Your going to make yourself bipolar if you tie your emotions to his declarations of new interests as they are most likey to change. And there will be other changes. Families have gone berserk as their kids experiment and examine other lifestyles, type of people, religions, eating habits...you name it.</p>
<p>Duckwoman, you touched on a very important subject. Your son will be paid for listening to people talk all day. IMHO, we have created a world full of people in need of a couch. I see it in my family, my friends, and many kids. We live in a worrisome world where values have gone crazy. Your son will likely be more successful than any of us.</p>
<p>Forget about talking all day. If he works as a clinical psychologist he will be doing far more listening than talking. As for analyzing you, that is an occupational hazard of adolescence that will pass once he decides that there are more interesting people on the planet to figure out than his parents. If he really likes to talk there is always politics.</p>
<p>they would disown their children at the thought of them majoring in the liberal arts field. or cut them off $$$.</p>
<p>.....Not all asians are the same. My husband and I are asian engineers and our son wants to major in liberal arts and I think he should do it, at least to break the stereotype!</p>
<p>OK, kind of a strange question here: are there fewer minorities in liberal arts than in the sciences? I was looking at a college website of a university my son is seriously considering and there was definitely no cultural diversity amongst the featured liberal arts freshmen. Are these fields just for wasps?</p>
<p>I think duckwoman has an interesting question:</p>
<p>If a school is showing its engineering program and you see all males, or all one or an other racial group (surface assumption, yes, if you see a picture with all white folks for liberal arts, asians for the sciences, females for law) it woul make me wonder a bit as well</p>
<p>Me: comparative literature at Yale, now university professor and visiting scholar at Columbia
Younger brother: psychology/theater studies at Yale, now counselor and fellow at NYU</p>
<p>We're Puerto Ricans born and raised on the island.</p>
<p>I think those of us that entered professional fields with a great deal of inertia built into the process (medicine, engineering) find the 'lack of linearity' of humanities/social sciences/liberal arts education a bit unsettling. It has been helpful to see my children doing internships in fields that are related to their majors, it is helpful to have friends who are not in 'engineering or medicine' and understand their life paths. Mostly, it is helpful to see kids who are thriving and loving doing what they do- and marveling at how someone really could want to wake up early 3 times/week to go and discuss 'Paradise Lost'. </p>
<p>I would say 60% of the HS seniors I have spoken with are planning to major in Psychology. I blame the really fine IB Psychology teacher and all those hours spent on efforts to try to understand themselves and their parents! Why wouldn't any 17 or 18 year old want to do it for the rest of their life? It is where they are developmentally!</p>
<p>Look at an AP psych book and you'll find there's a lot more science these days, even at the entry level. I took a couple of psych courses eons ago to get social science credit; I liked it but thought it far too easy in comparison to my chemistry major. Your son may be very good in math/science but interest trumps ability- relax and let him explore this field. He may find it boring eventually or be able to use his science abilities to make real contributions to the field. </p>
<p>Aside- as physicians my husband and I have told people who have asked if son will follow us that he is too smart to be a physician; it sure has changed, even for people who want to take care of patients not just make money.</p>
<p>For all of you who may want to criticize the OP- I can understand where she is coming from and why she is upset.</p>
<p>Arrrgh. I was hoping my son would get to interact with a more diverse population in college since his high school is as blonde-haired, blue-eyed as they come (yes, I should've left out the "P" in "WASP.") (We live in a smallesh rural town, we didn't select a fancy-shmancy private school or anything.) So he goes and picks a major that seems to attract DAR candidates. I give up.</p>