I just want to help...

All my life, I’ve always wanted my future college major and career to be something where I could help people. I want to make some kind of difference. However, I do not like medical. What can I do?

There are lots of different ways to “help” people. It depends on your definition of “help,” and how much direct help you want to do.

The traditional non-medical helping professors are some kind of counseling, social services, or public works/education - psychologist, counselor, social worker, community health educator, teacher. Those are probably the first things that come to mind.

But you can “help people” in pretty much any career that you pick. For example, you could become an accountant who works in low-income communities helping people file their taxes and teaching financial literacy. You could be an civil engineer employed by a municipal government who ensures structural integrity of state-owned buildings. You could be a software engineer who works at a nonprofit maintaining the software suite that enables them to help others. You could be a statistician who helps small businesses solve problems to keep them afloat. And so on.

And then, there are less altruistic and direct ways to help people. My job is to make the tech my company makes user-friendly. We sell it, and it’s not necessarily tech for the greater good - it’s video games. But the work I do still touches lives every day, and some of it improves those lives or those experiences. Knowing that is satisfying enough for me.

Thank you @juillet