Hi, I’m in Engineering undecided but I’m actually fully undecided but my college doesnt allow that as an option. Up until now, I thought I was just going to stay in science in technology, but then there are things about Law, Business, and the Medical Field that interest me too.
What is honestly the best thing to do to get an actual feel of that major/what that major does in the real world?
My college doesn’t allow for much elective space and I don’t want to be so screwed over that I graduate behind and waste money.
PLEASE HELP!!! It’s 2:42 am and I can’t sleep because all I think about is how screwed everything will be if I transfer and how disappointed my family will be because my other two siblings had bad turn of events too.
First of all, just breathe. For now, since classes aren’t going on, I would say a good thing to do would be to go to a list of your school’s majors and explore the curricula of them, noting which ones seem interesting. Most schools have general requirements, regardless of what you are majoring in, that you have to fulfill. See if you can find law, business, medical, etc. classes that fulfill these requirements, that way you can both fulfill the requirements and test out these other subjects. It is better to do this earlier than later, since it will give you more room in the future. Talk to people in the majors that you are interested in and do research online. It takes a lot of patience but the more you learn about all this the easier it gets.
Selecting a major is a sophisticated task that requires full analysis of options to avoid future regrets. You have to be fully aware of certain aspects that are related to different majors in order to decide on the best approach. First, you have to be aware of you skills and expertise so that you may choose a major that corresponds to them. You also have to consider your interests to determine the most appropriate major.
You should also recognise your level of commitment since various majors require different levels of schooling. Analyse the educational efforts required for each optional major to determine which best suits your level of commitment. Finally, after selecting the most suiting major, it is important to enrol in an institution that is well recognised for its excellence in that particular major.
Actually one of the best things would be for you to talk to people working in those fields. Talk to lawyers, also visit the law section here on CC. Find out what issues doctors are dealing with these days, talk to engineers etc. See if any friends or family know people in the fields you are looking at.
It’s not just about the schooling, it’s about what you’ll be doing the rest of your life.
Selecting a major isn’t a sophisticated task. Your major doesn’t determine your entire life’s chances. It just determines what you study in the next few years and, to a small extent, what jobs/careers are immediately open to you in the first few years after college - but only to a small extent. An English major can’t be an engineer without additional training, for example, but she can certainly go into a variety of careers in business or tech or manufacturing or pharmaceuticals. It depends on her interests and skills and experience, but it’s not like majors route you into neat little boxes.
Different majors also don’t necessarily require different levels of school. With almost any major you can be successful on the bachelor’s level without graduate degrees - it’s only that certain careers require grad school. So a psychology major doesn’t need a graduate degree to be successful; he only needs a grad degree if he specifically wants to be a psychologist.
And it’s not at all important to enroll college that’s well-recognized for excellence in a major. First of all, undergraduate majors - with the exception of vocational ones like nursing, business, and engineering - aren’t recognized for excellence on a wide scale. They shouldn’t be, because it’s not like a graduate program where that’s your sole course of study. You’ll actually take more classes outside of your major than in it, and you won’t be an expert in whatever you major in after you finish. It’s just a foundation on which to build additional skills.
In fact, OP, it is these things you need to be armed with to realize that you’re not making some kind of irreversible career decision that will change the rest of your life. If you want to major in engineering, you could also later explore law, business, or medicine. MANY engineering majors later get MBAs, and even if you never do there’s always the opportunity to go into management or tech business with an engineering degree. You don’t have to be a formal engineer. As long as you keep your grades up, you could later choose to go into medical school - or even into another allied health profession, like nursing, pharmacy, occupational therapy, or physicians assistant. You might later have to take some prerequisites, but many many people do that. Similarly, if your grades are high enough, you can go to law school later in life - or work in adjunct fields to law, like science policy, advocacy, lobbying, or paralegal work. If you major in engineering you can do a lot of different things - you’re not trapped or pigeonholed into just being an engineer.
There are two answers to your last question. The best way to get a feel for a major is to take classes in it. It also is good to talk to a variety of majors who are in their junior and senior years, as they can give you a sense for how the upper-level classes are different from the lower-level course of study. The best way to get a feel for what a major does in the real world is internships, but you can also do informational interviews with people working in potential fields.
@julliet Thanks julliet! I like the fact that you said that i’m not making an irreversible career decision that will change the rest of my life. My family makes a big deal out of the fact that what I chose is final. I can’t really talk to them about being uncertain because they get mad, so I’m glad there’s cc. And I got nervous when the user was describing what I should do before I choose the institution, which is kind of too late now, so your post helped. And @artie1 suggested it as well, which is to talk to people of that major/field. I’ll try to look more into the different areas of the majors/jobs on cc and contact someone at my school or in the field i’m interested in taking a look in. Like i said, my school doesn’t offer a lot of elective space so if I’m honestly interested in learning more about a major, I think I will take a course at a local community college, if that’s possible. This will take out of pocket money, but I hope by the end of it I will have a better idea of what I want. I hope my adviser will help me when i get the chance to talk to her.
Thanks again everyone!
Ironically, engineering is a great degree to go a LOT of different directions- as @juillet points out, many go into management (look at how many CEOs have an engineering background), but law, medicine, and many other fields have lots of people with engineering backgrounds as well. It is also one of the best majors for starting out with a solid salary.
But, from your other posts, it is hard to tell what’s actually going on. It seems you have had a lot of drama and uncertainty all the way through- what to study, where to study it. Are you about to start as a first year at Drexel in September? If so, you are way overthinking this. Go start your course. Nail your first year grades. By November be looking for summer internships- talk to your advisor, read the emails you will get about internship opportunities, etc. Be applying for them by January (latest!). One step at a time.