I have applied to 5 schools and I have heard back from and I was accepted into 3. I applied for aerospace engineering but I am increasingly interested in politics and I am already thinking of changing my major to political science/government/public policy or double majoring or getting a minor in political science. I am still very interested in aerospace engineering but I am afraid that I will be bored with it or I will not do well in the field. The schools that I have been accepted to so far are University of Cincinnati, Purdue and FloridaTech, which are engineering schools and not very liberal art schools, well maybe UC. What would you do? Are there many job openings for political science? Do most work with Congress as assistants?
It would make sense to go to a school which caters to both tracks.
http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Degree=Bachelor_of_Arts_%28BA%29%2c_Political_Science_%28PolySci%29/Salary and http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Degree=Bachelor_of_Science_%28BS_%2f_BSc%29%2c_Political_Science_%28PolySci%29/Salary show what some people actually went on to become after a bachelor’s in political science. It appears that there are a lot of jobs political sci majors can get into, although they are rarely specifically sought by employers.
You can do a lot of different things with a political science major. I’m betting that the majority of poli sci majors don’t end up actually working in politics, much less with Congress as assistants (Congressional intern jobs are hard to get and people of all majors and educational backgrounds do that kind of work). You could go into business or work at a think tank, nonprofit, or NGO. You could also work at another government agency.
Purdue is not an engineering school. I see a lot of people say that on these forums, and Purdue does have strengths in the sciences, but Purdue is very much a liberal arts university that has great programs in a variety of fields. It actually has a pretty well-reputed political science department.
Florida Tech doesn’t have a political science major, though, so if you want to explore I would recommend choosing one of the other two schools to which you were accepted. It’s also good to wait and see what those other two say.
As far as which you should major in, take classes in both once you’re there and see how it goes. You never really know until you take classes.
If you do stick with aerospace, fitting in a double major may be difficult because of the heavy requirements. But that wouldn’t stop you from filling up some elective slots with poli sci classes if you’re so inclined, possibly enough for a minor.