<p>I'm a pretty new member. I was just checking the site out and am AMAZED at the quality of students here. Seriously. Are you all injected with some 'superhuman' dna when born? Hahah..moving on...I was just wondering how many of you guys are heading to college with a career in mind? What majors do you have and why?</p>
<p>I'm going to college next year and am thinking about Psychology, International Relations, and Political Science.</p>
<p>I really want to have a career that will benefit others in need (think poverty, children from 3rd world countries that NEED help, etc). I thought if I studied Political Science and International Relations I can really help people like that by changing policies, etc. </p>
<p>But, ironically, I'm really ignorant of the political world. I've heard that 'politicians' are liars, etc. etc. and I don't know if I can handle the 'bad stuff' that goes on in the political world. ...or maybe I'm just paranoid :-/.</p>
<p>Anyways tell me what you think...and post your majors/dreams.</p>
<p>Bump is to make the thread go to the top of the list of threads so more people can see it and reply. </p>
<p>IMOH = in my honest opinion</p>
<p>don't worry too much about majors --> careers at this point. if you want to help 3rd world countries, maybe you could go into business, earn a lot of money, start a charity? polisci majors don't always become politicians/policy makers. they also go to law school, go into business, i dunno. this sounds cliche, but seriously, study something you love and are good at. you can do a lot of things in this world; i bet 90% of the stuff you learn in classrooms you're never going to use in the real world. what you do use is the skills you learn and the new ways you're taught to think.</p>
<p>for me? i'm still thinking on it. there are so many jobs in this world and you have years and years to work and maybe work your way up. so right now i'm just taking classes, trying to learn as much as i can.</p>
<p>Career: Personal trainer and/or Strength & Conditioning Coach, or something in sports management, probably in equipment for a university or for a company like Nike or Adidas.</p>
<p>But this is my 3rd major, so things can change easily.</p>
<p>Lol, I have no idea what I want to do. My major is anthropology and I really like it, and I know I'll be going to grad school with it eventually (you sort of have to. to get any kind of decent job in it, you need at least a masters) but right now I really don't know what I want to actually do. </p>
<p>For a while, I was thinking about (anthropological) museum studies, which still interests me but I don't know if I could handle the really boring parts of that: the paperwork and such. </p>
<p>Recently, since starting to take physical anthro. I've become really interested in other primates. I already liked chimps, but I've become more interested in gorillas and orangutans as well. So maybe I'll do something to work with them. I think it'd be amazing to work in Africa trying to conserve their habitats and things; I really want to go to Africa in general.</p>
<p>I'm an Econ major also working towards a certificate towards Health Policy and I pretty much want to do the same thing as asdfjkl1. I too <3 Microfinance, although I'd also like to eventually work for the World Bank or the IMF.</p>
<p>I like the World Bank but the policies of the World Bank/IMF tend to worsen the situation of many developing nations. They burden them with debt instead of truly helping them.</p>
<p>I'm a politics and history major. There's quite a difference between what people think of when they consider politics, and the actual nature of things. Really, within politics you can generally study political theory, american politics, comparative politics, and international politics. Very different fields, but all are rather theoretical, rather than being specifically about development and such.</p>
<p>yesss!! I am an international affairs major. I am taking 2 political science classes right now and they are pretty basic. if you aren't really big into politics, don't worry about it. the basic intro classes are more about theories (sometimes slow going, I won't lie) but you don't immediately jump into analyzing politicians. it's like a gradual shift into caring, I guess. and you HAVE to start reading the news everyday so if you do that already you've got a head start</p>
<p>Career: Lawyer, specializing in international aviation law, corporate law, M&A/securities, and civil litigation/white collar defense.
As an aside, I love microfinance too, but I hate the people I'll end up working with if I go with ibanking. From what I've seen on wallstreetoasis, they seem just a tad....insecure or something.</p>
<p>Zicon189 - what type of theories?... when you take the class do you know how to relate what you learn to real politics or is it like a lecture class? Should I start reading national papers then? Hmm..maybe I should begin with my local one haha </p>
<p>Saxonthebeach6 - i don't get it..how is econ and bioengineering related to law school? ..sorry...</p>
<p>Hmm..there seems to be alot of microfinance lovers in here...maybe we should change the name of the topic to microfinance lovers unite???</p>
<p>AUlostchick - that sounds really cool :) I've seen shows on the animal channel about that and the baby chimps are SO adorable! </p>
<p>Sidequestion: Can I post in college section even if I'm not in college yet?</p>
<p>Fanatic 517 - So political science is more about theories? what do you mean by 'developmental'?</p>
<p>Because you don't learn anything particularly useful or interesting. It's the reading volume of an English major, only it's useless facts instead of useless fiction.</p>
<p>Well, politics isn't really so much about the day to day things that people associate with government or politics. It can tackle the nature of democracy or power, the ways states interact, looking comparatively at the different dynamics of state-economic-labor relations, or the way people interact with and regard practical elements of politics. Basically, it encompasses a ton, and can be quite theoretical (but so very fascinating). </p>
<p>And since you mentioned helping people in third world countries, I thought you might be interested in the sort of developmental work that a lot of NGO's and non-profits are involved in--the sort of thing to which the study of politics can be very relevant.</p>
<p>sorry, tnguyen, I don't come here often and just noticed you asked me a question!
so, a month after the fact... the political science theories I'm learning focus on different ways to analyze the international system (realism, liberalism, constructivism). they're not like geometry theories where you can just apply them to things... they're more like schools of thought. For example, liberalists focus on the way the world should be, while realists focus on the way the world is. so no it doesn't directly relate to politics the way you're thinking about it... it relates more to addressing issues that face the international system (i.e. Iran's nuclear weapons program - I just had to write a paper on that).
for my international relations class (which is a Poli Sci class), I have to subscribe to the Financial Times. It's a course requirement (and an annoying one, but oh well). Since I'm an international affairs major, domestic issues don't concern me as much as international ones -- such as the protests and violence in Tibet -- so my main source of news is the New York Times (I'm not a fan of the Financial Times).</p>
<p>I'm interested in the same things you are and I'm considering international economic development. My school has a minor for that in its school of Agriculture, Economics, and Development and a similar major in International Studies. So you might need to look around to find it, if your school has something similar.</p>
<p>Luminaire - I wouldn't be so quick to judge things as "useless." It reflects poorly on your attitude.</p>