Thank you all. I AM proud of him… We are just hoping that the donee is doing well.
Anyone else’s kid struggling with decisions around their major? Dd really likes accting, but she can’t stay in her current major (finance with a yr at Dauphine in Paris) and complete an accting major. She doesn’t want to drop her current major bc she wants it, too! She is pretty much driving herself crazy bc she has to make a decision and just doesn’t know which path to take. She is meeting with her accting teacher this week to talk about career options in accting, but she feels like she is going to regret whatever decision she makes bc she doesn’t have enough real life information to make an informed choice.
This is way outside of our engineering lives experience, so we just listen and tell her to talk to people who might have more insight.
Is it possible for your D to act at her current college without being either a major or a minor? S17 is a theater tech BFA major at a school known for its performance programs. Despite the fact that there is a BFA in MT and one in acting, as well as BA in theater, kids from non-performance majors are allowed to audition and from what I see, they are cast. If your D can still audition and be cast, then maybe she can just take theater classes as electives or to fulfill gen eds, without actually declaring a major. If she can’t and she really wants acting, then she has to either transfer or perhaps spend her summers working in local or community theater to get her experience in.
I love the website IMDB. I look up almost every show I watch and I have learned that many actors don’t start until later and many never studied acting in college. For example, Steve Buscemi was a NYC firefighter before going into acting. The guy who played Uncle Joe on Petticoat Junction was a successful dentist before turning his practice over to his wife and pursuing acting. Bottom line - unlike engineering, accounting, medicine or law, there’s no real requirement that a prospective actor actually study acting or have a degree in it to get work.
Good luck.
@techmom99 Your son is a wonderful young man! As an aside, I believe that Mom2aphysicsgeek was referring to accounting, not acting, but I could be wrong…
@Mom2aphysicsgeek Major? What major? 
Yes, accounting, not acting. Sorry about that. One of the dilemmas she has is that her current major is in the international business dept and if she switches majors, she cannot get back into the French cohort. Period. It is an all or nothing proposition.
But thank you @techmom99 for thinking about my dd!!!
Lol, you are probably right! I missed the second “C.” That’s what I get for reading without my glasses. And, thank you, my son is a great kid, but the bottom line, almost any kid can sign up and potentially do the same thing.
@Mom2aphysicsgeek - In the words of the late, great Gilda Radner “NEVER MIND!” I don’t have any advice for your actual dilemma, although personally I think I would rather be eternally unemployed than to be an accountant.
@techmom99 almost any kid could sign up. Most will not. Most would never even consider it,or say no if asked He’s a special kid. It matters and you should be very proud.
@techmom99 Many years ago, my mother died of a cancer for which stem cell transplants are now an effective form of treatment. It matters.
yeah @techmom99 your kid has a good head on his shoulders. My son17 is a nice young man too, but I just couldn’t see him going out of his way to do that. So, props to your son.
@Mom2aphysicsgeek I would suggest she stick with finance to protect the IB path and use her business electives for additional accounting classes. Accounting and finance majors usually only differ by 4-7 courses. Both finance and accounting can lead to similar career paths. And if she ultimately wants a CPA, she can do the MAcc (though she may already have the necessary 150 credits to sit which would make that unnecessary.
My D still loves accounting. She is struggling with her senior year, which will be a masters program. She has been intending to do the MAcc. But they just introduced a BS in Business Analytics, which is a far more valuable masters (since she will be well over the CPA required 150 credits by senior year) and better use of her time. The MAcc has no added marketplace value and she is already a good test-taker. So thats her dilemma. She will take a computer science class next year or junior year and decide what she wants to do.
@itsgettingreal17 That is the problem. She can’t fit in the accting courses if she stays in the CIFA cohort. I am not sure why, exactly. It might have to do with the yr abroad and Dauphine’s course requirements (they aren’t just studying abroad. They are Dauphine students. They have even narrowed the CIFA program to eliminate Econ as a possible major.) She has to take French courses every semester for CIFA ((which she wants to do anyway). And, she wants to take Russian every semester, too.
I told her to look at employment options, but I don’t know anything about those myself. Looking online, it looks like accting with foreign lang background is a good mix. I can’t get a clear picture of finance and her foreign interests. She would like to keep her yr abroad in France. Do you have any insight on the foreign language plus accting mix? Is it real or just hype? Links that would help clarify the finance vs accting career options?
I think the biggest issue for her right now is that she just doesn’t feel like she really understands the 2 paths clearly enough to make an informed choice. She has gone to every speaker they have had on campus and has asked a lot of questions, but she still isn’t clear. (And since we don’t know anything about either field, we aren’t very helpful.) I do know when she describes accting that it is some part of corporate accting that she is interested in, not what I think of in terms of accting.
@mamaedefamilia - I have also had relatives die of blood cancers which are now treatable, including one of my uncles who died when I was 17.
I think that many people, like your son, don’t sign up because they just aren’t aware of the need for it or of how the process works… The actual process isn’t that bad. Once you match, you have to go for blood work. If that’s a close enough match, you get further blood testing. If you are chosen as a match, you are asked not to donate blood and to be available for a period of time while the patient’s doctors figure things out. If you do the peripheral blood stem cell, you first go for a complete physical and more blood work. Then, you have to get 5 shots of a medicine that stimulates the cells to grow. The last shot is given at the time of the donation, which takes about 6 to 8 hours. You may have achiness from the shots but OTC meds help. You can’t do heavy lifting or the like for a few weeks. S17 didn’t consider it a huge intrusion into his life. He actually did the donation during his winter break and had 3 weeks to recuperate before going back to school. H and I signed up in 1990 on behalf of a friend from school. Our kids grew up with an awareness of the issue. One of the more interesting (bizarre) tidbits about this is that S17 shares a birthday with the friend for whom we first registered. Our friend did receive a transplant but sadly contracted an infection and passed away.
@techmom99 I’ve been on be the match donor list for years and was a close match once but they ended up finding a better match. I am so glad to hear that it worked out and that your son is feeling great after the procedure. What an amazing kid!
Thank you.
@techmom99 I admire your son for doing something so selfless. Thank you for sharing the process. I didn’t realize it wasn’t more invasive. How does one go about signing up? Is there a website or…
I, too, read @Mom2aphysicsgeek 's post as acting. It was only after I saw people referring to accounting that I went back and noticed the second “c”. And I’m wearing my glasses, LOL!
In D17 news she has applied as a priority transfer from a small liberal arts college to a large public research U and is awaiting a decision. It’s funny, after putting so much time and energy into helping her with her initial college selection, I find myself sitting back and letting her drive the transfer process completely on her own. I think this has been a lesson to me that there is no perfect college, and I think I will be calmer when it’s time for S22 to apply.
@NolaCAR wow, that’s a major shift. Sending her good luck wishes!
@NolaCAR Best wishes to your D! The saying is true: you can make a big school smaller, but can’t make a small school bigger. A small LAC isn’t a good fit for many, and I’d even say most students.
@NolaCAR Good luck to your D on the transfer. Sometimes the process of elimination works!
@NolaCAR Wow–but good for her for handling it and owning the process!
S17 is off now for spring break; he’ll fly home tonight. So of course, we got ~10" of snow last night and into this morning. :-S At least it has stopped snowing now, and the roads are reasonably clear. Earlier flights today were cancelled, but the airport seems open now with some schedules delayed. I’m just looking forward to seeing him and talking again. He’s been crazy-busy lately, so we haven’t heard much from him.
@NolaCAR Good luck to your daughter. Sounds like she has it under control (which is an accomplishment all in itself).
Hard to believe that spring breaks are already here. Looking forward to seeing my daughter next weekend.