As the title says, I’m graduating with a B.A. in English Literature from a T50 flagship and deeply regret my choice. As a transfer student, I put my focus freshman/sophomore year into resume building, treating f/s essentially as remedial college prep. Now: I’m a senior, excellent GPA, no debt, feel terrible and am open to further schooling.
My interests have primarily been in creative fields related to design and media, though I’m also interested in financial growth potential and a leadership/strategy role. I want to be able to work with ideas, facts, and/or aesthetics. I enjoy the outdoors, photography/film, collaging, architecture, interiors, oceans, computers (though I don’t know how to program) and economics (though I never took calculus).
TLDR; Regretful English Major, INTP, career tests suggest executive, lawyer, or artist (lol) Absolutely no interest in education/social work/teaching. Any advice or suggestions I might not have thought of?
English majors make good lawyers and executives. English majors generally develop excellent reading, writing, research and analytical skills. Add those to your creative interests and talents and I am not sure why you are pessimistic and regretful.
Public policy and nonprofit work in an area that interests you. I work with an English BA grad right now - he is helping update our small organization’s website (having no prior skills in this), helping with other communication issues, and will be moving into more research and report writing eventually. He has fewer skills than I would have liked with Excel but is learning. There are free tutorials on Excel and other useful skills - look and see what the ads are asking for.
I wouldn’t recommend going right into grad school until you have a better idea of what is out there. You didn’t mention what work experiences you have had.
Also university or community college websites have an employment section and there are jobs there for admin types who can help administer grants and other aspects of programs, admissions, etc. - good for a recent grad.
In response to your interest you have a lot of fun options. I will list a few ideas based on what you shared to help you brainstorm:
With your outdoors interest you could consider different roles within the fish and wildlife community, archaeology, recreational parks, land surveying, ocean preservation jobs.
With your interest in film you can use your English background to screenwrite, edit, engage in maybe some director of photography for movies
With your interest in collaging you can begin a scrapbooking business or get paid to run workshops at nursing homes or camps for interested parties who would love activities that teach them how to collage or serve as activities director
With your interest in finances you can consider a role at a wealth management firm or with a financial services coaching company that comes with training.
Those are just starters but you have a great smorgasbord of interests and your degree is an excellent foundation because written communication is essential to all industries!
I have several colleagues with English degrees that are in Product Management. They all say their degree is an asset to them, even if not directly related. Based on your 2 sentences of interests, I’d say you’d do well as a Product Manager.