<p>I got accepted to the film major at uci, but I'm wondering if it is a good major choice...
Does anyone have any idea about the film major? How's the learning or social atmosphere there?? What internship can students get? Do they have good connection with other schools? Thank you!!</p>
<p>To some extent, it doesn’t matter what you major in and the more prestigious the university the more this is true(there are stories of philosophy majors becoming investment bankers out of the ivy league, while econ majors at state schools usually have less luck). UCI is itself a middle of the road school. It’s not “elite” but you won’t be looked down upon for having attended it either. </p>
<p>Majoring in Film means a hard life. If you want your dream job out of college, you’ll likely have to work TWICE as hard as someone taking a more “conventional” route through Science, Technology, Engineering, Math or Business. You’d need more internships and at better places, exceptional leadership skills(be president at one or two clubs) and a very high GPA. Employers know that a film major learned virtually nothing of “value” by conventional measures and they expect you to be self made.</p>
<p>With so much said, it’s not hard to change majors once you’re in at UCI or to even double major. Here’s an interesting fact, we get recruiters(if not officially then unofficially) from Paramount, CNN, and Disney on campus/career website. Majoring in film and minoring in accounting is a solid combination which conveys interest and makes you “unique”.</p>
<p>xelink: Your advices are so valuable for me! I’ll think about what I want in the college all over again. I’m choosing between Syracuse university and UC irvine btw…
I think you really pointed out something that i’ve never thought about. Thank you so much for giving me these opinions. btw, I will seriously consider about minoring in accounting, which was exactly the same with what my mom told me!!</p>
<p>Please note that I’m personally interested in accounting, finance and consulting so I’m not the person to necessarily ask about something like the entertainment industry. </p>
<p>I’ll let you in on what employers look for in the traditional “business” industries
1 Big names, be it the school you went to or the places you worked at
2 Relevant work experience
3 High GPA
4 Leadership roles/high involvement in extra curriculars. If at all possible, try to balance “professional” activities with social activities, you don’t want to just be a uni-dimensional person.
5 Major/minors
6 Technical skills and certifications</p>
<p>The order might flux a little from place to place, but that’s the gist of it. Obviously for things that require certain technical skills(engineering for example), the major might be looked at a bit more. At the end of the day, you need to balance relevance and prestige in what you do for internships(e.g. doing something BIG for a small unknown company or doing something less significant for a very well known firm) ideally, you would do both. Personally feel that it’s best to shoot for big names as they tend to help you get more interviews and allow you to step up from one experience to the next.</p>
<p>A close friend of mine did accounting at UCI and got a job at KPMG. (or one of the big 4. they’re all the same to me…)</p>
<p>some things i noticed:
- she didn’t have any relevant work experience. She had some “college” jobs (note taker, desk clerk at the ARC, target) but nothing special like internships or anything.
- She had a “high” GPA. I’m not sure how high… I’m a physical science major interesting in graduate school so anything below a 3.5 is considered low. I was told anything above a 3.0 is considered great for the job market. go figure.
- Once she got in, all that mattered was getting that CPA. When she failed that, they kicked her out (unfortunately). </p>
<p>of course, this was all pre-recession. there’s an accounting association at UCI that you should really look into if you’re interested.</p>
<p>Studying film means your life will be hard and probably living from paycheck to paycheck. I have a friend who graduated from UCI with film. He hasn’t found ANY employment for a year. He finally took up a job, but it was a minimum wage paying job. He just needed something to pay the bills.</p>
<p>I have another friend from Cal studying film. She just graduated. We’ll see what happens to her.</p>