<p>I'm starting college this fall and I really don't have any idea what I want to major in and even less of an idea of what I want to do with my life. I'm going to a Top 20 and got most of it paid for so I'm not unintelligent and I'm not lazy, although I never had to work too hard in high school for the most part (pre-calc, AP Chem and AP Phyics aside), I just don't know what interests me major/career-wise. Like a lot of people, I always thought I'd become a doctor and medicine does still interest me very much but I've come to the realization that I really don't like school which certainly isn't a good trait for a would-be doctor. I think the biggest reason why I dislike school and especially the prospect of college is that nothing attracts me academically. I've poured over my schools course catalog repeatedly and heavily researched anything that sounded remotely interesting to no avail. And since I've gotten so much AP credit that I'm two classes away from my AA, my academic advisors made me choose a major (Biology) that I have no real interest in. </p>
<p>As for general life interests, I have several but I don't think any of them are viable career options. For example, I like to write but that's a not stable career path in the slightest and I don't want to be a failure of a writer and wind up as an English teacher who's unfilled in their career and miserable (I had two English teachers just like that). I like technology but I absolutely hate math and am really not very good at it (pre-calc was absolute torture), so that rules out Comp Sci. I used to like building stuff when I was younger and still enjoy it today though to a much lesser degree but said difficulty with math also rules out Engineering and Architecture. Something I really enjoy, and is probably my most useless interest, is learning about random things. Like, I really enjoy just clicking through links to various Wikipedia pages that have nothing to do with one another and learning about new stuff. That said, I hate history. AP US History is the only class I've ever slept through and I did it every time I was in the class - I find it incredibly boring so that rules out an Anthropology or Histroy major.</p>
<p>Forget about majors for a second. Can you find at least four or five courses that you want to take next semester? Can you list those courses for us?</p>
<p>If you can’t even find courses to take, you probably shouldn’t be attending this university right now. That doesn’t mean that you are lazy or dumb or a failure. It might mean that you are burned out from academics and need a break, or it might mean that your current interests may not align with the principles of a liberal arts education.</p>
<p>Could you imagine taking non-liberal-artsy courses? I am thinking of EMT courses, web design, paralegal studies, commercial music management, culinary arts, early childhood education, electronics, anything like that?</p>
<p>Or maybe you just need a break from school. Could you see yourself doing an apprenticeship in the trades, volunteer in a medical clinic in Africa, watch children and learn a new language as an Au Pair in France, work for a non-profit in the US? Maybe deferring your admission offer and taking a gap year might help you get to know yourself and leave you refreshed for the new stage in your education! </p>
<p>I was kinda bored with academics at my German high school until I spent an exchange year in the US. Besides English and math, my entire schedule was filled with fun classes: computer graphics, accounting, parenting, psychology… I had a great time, learned many good skills that are still helping me today, and I was looking forward to academics again when I got back to Germany!</p>
<p>Wait. Your college made you declare as a freshman, even though your “college credit” is just from AP? That’s strange and doesn’t really seem right. I can see how that would be frustrating.</p>
<p>That being said, when signing up for classes, take a biology class but don’t hesitate to take a bunch of other courses that sound somewhat interesting. You don’t have to love them. They just have to be a little interesting, so that you don’t hate your life and want to drop out. If you can’t find a load of classes that you’d be happy with, I agree with barium. You might want to consider a gap year doing something else. Working, volunteering, traveling. Does politics interest you? This year is an election year.</p>
<p>I’m sorry it took me so long to respond but I completely forgot I had posted this. Not attending school this year is not an option - my parents don’t care where I go to school or what I major in but they demand that I go to college. Maybe after this year when I have some money together (I just got a job) I could take a year off, but right now I just can’t. </p>
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All the creative/fictional writing classes interest me, but that’s no surprise. However, some of the poly sci classes seem interesting. The concept of law is intriguing to me but knowing of the abysmal job placement rates among new law school graduates has pushed the idea of becoming a lawyer out of my mind and seeing a few criminal proceedings on tv (namely Casey Anthony) it seems much more boring than I thought it would be. Going off this:</p>
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The concept of politics does interest me, but after seeing the corruption and unjust influence of corporations which define it I’m pretty disillusioned to the whole thing. However, something I have learned from politics is that I enjoy the nature of the work itself - I think something I crave in career (and possibly a reason school disinterests me so much) is a fast pace. I like things to be happening constantly and I’ve found through my years of school that I work best under pressure and deadlines - it’s what lights my fire and drives me to do things. I think this may be a reason I was at first interested in law, I know this is going to sound stupid but TV portrays it as being this fast-paced almost competition between the opposing sides and a lot of on the fly thinking is required. Obviously, that’s not the case though. I think my interest in medicine, surgery in particular, is of similar nature. I do, however, also enjoy the puzzle-like aspect medicine provides.</p>
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Out of all those, the only one that interests me is culinary arts. I do like to cook, a lot, but all the chefs I’ve ever spoken with have offered one resounding piece of advice - “Don’t become a chef if you love to cook.” Apparently, the hours are horrendous and the pay is minuscule, but more importantly they rarely got to express themselves as chefs because they were working in someone else’s kitchen making the same recipes over and over and over for years at a time (owning your own restaurant is incredibly expensive and most fail quite quickly from what I’ve heard). </p>
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That it’s from AP doesn’t matter at my school, I get the college credit for my scores so I am technically a sophomore. And since nearly all my gen eds are done, I have no other choice but to move on to major-fulfilling courses. They sort of scared me out of declaring myself as undecided. </p>
<p>Thank you all for taking the time to respond to my post, I really appreciate it and other advice you could give.</p>
<p>Fwiw, US History and anthropology have about as much to do with each other as biology and astrology. Sure, it might come up in one of the courses but not really</p>
<p>I share one of your traits, the “enjoying looking up random crap on Wikipedia”, and one of the things that never really gets old to me is language. One of the things constantly at the back of my mind as far as major choices is linguistics (the study of language).</p>
<p>Of course, it’s one of those degrees that isn’t really immediately useful by itself, but it opens doors to a whole lot of diverse career opportunities, from things as mundane as teaching ESL to things as exotic as preserving endangered languages. You said you enjoy English, but do you enjoy the mechanics of it, or just the writing? I find grammar to actually be fun.</p>
<p>It’s one of those things you’d have to really look into to see if you would really enjoy it, since it takes a fair commitment of time and may not be as easy to find a job as other more utilitarian degrees, but it’s a thought.</p>
<p>“Something I really enjoy, and is probably my most useless interest, is learning about random things. Like, I really enjoy just clicking through links to various Wikipedia pages that have nothing to do with one another and learning about new stuff.”</p>
<p>You sound like me. I do the exact same thing. When I rarely do watch TV, it’s to watch the Science Channel, Animal Planet, Nat Geo channel, I admit I watch a lot of Boomerang too, gotta have my old school cartoons. And on the internet, I do the exact same thing you described in that paragraph. </p>
<p>I think a lot of people are probably like this.</p>