I am a college Freshman that is currently stuck between 2 majors: Early Childhood Education and Hospitality Management with a minor in Business Management.
I want a job that has a good work-life balance but it seems like neither of these majors have potential careers like that. I also want a somewhat decent pay, weekends and holidays off.
I don’t even know whether or not I like teaching… I love kids but I hear the work hours are horrible with a lot of planning, evaluations, and no respect. I am not very artistic and I fear this will cause me to not work well with young kids. I also am not your typical “ray of sunshine, pooping rainbows” person, and I do not want to be judged for what I do outside of the classroom.
Meanwhile, my hospitality degree could lead me to being a hotel/restaurant manager or an event coordinator, but I hear those all have extremely long work hours. I have great organizational skills but I currently have no experience in the customer service industry. I love the idea of advancement but I fear that this career path will be TOO competitive and cut-throat.
I am very good at writing/editing, fast typing, technology, use of computers, and research. I love kids, animals, history, music, traveling, food, and having a meaningful impact on others. I love helping people and giving advice. I am not very good at math or math-based science and I have a history of anxiety when placed in high-stress situations. Which major sounds like it fits me best, and if neither of these degrees sound like a good fit, what does?
Given that these are degrees that are typically geared towards specific careers, what experience do you have with either option? You say you’re not sure if you like teaching, but do you have experience working with this age group? Do you have any prior managerial experience? Event planning? For both of these paths, I think getting experience is the key to finding out whether you would actually be happy doing these things for your career.
Not all people who work with kids are “ray of sunshine” type people. One of my close friends is a play therapist and she’s an intensely practical person, but she’s still good at what she does. I’ve seen elementary school teachers with really different kinds of personalities.
Still, though, you’re setting up a false dichotomy. Being an elementary school teacher is not the only way that you can work with kids; if you love kids but don’t really like the idea of being a classroom teacher, there are other things you can do - even within schools (school psychologist or school social worker, for example. School nurse!)
Teaching is one of the easy things to get some experience with. Most schools love having volunteers come in, and there are tons of programs that allow college students to get some experience teaching, like Jumpstart. There are lots of summer programs where college students can teach, like Breakthrough Collaborative or Johns Hopkins’ Center for Talented Youth. If you are considering teaching but don’t know if you’d like it, get out there and get some experience to test it out and see!