I’m a prospective philosophy major, with a community/global health concentration. There is a big “doubletriplemajor culture” at my school and I’m starting to think about it.
I’m a tentative premed, and since I’m not sure of making it to medschool, my other interests are in public health, policy, journalism or law (not specifically lawyer, more in the policy/research). I’m thinking about anthropology/sociology since it also fulfill requirements for my concentration and would help for prehealth, women & gender studies which is what I’d like to focus my research on or something else!
The Thing is I don’t want to overload since I’ll also have to fulfill medschool requirements, but at the same time if medschool doesn’t work out I want to have ressources. I know how everything can change along the way but since registration is going to come around soon I’d rather be covered for my 1st term
All insights appreciated !
Stay safe and home if you can ?
Why double major and have more boxes to check when choosing courses when you can do one major and take whatever interesting other courses and pre-med courses without worrying about as many boxes to check?
@ucbalumnus I’m still thinking about it because it’d indeed be a big load to check all of the boxes; but most of the courses I want to take outside my major and premed do fulfill some ANSO and WGS requirements but not all. I just really want to be able to attend good masters programs if not medschool, and even if philosophy is respected I thought it could be too broad on its own for social science masters
Agree that double-majoring is extremely over-rated, relative to minoring or just taking free electives. ESPECIALLY for pre-meds. I know there’s a culture at your school, but there’s probably also a culture of binge drinking, and that’s not healthy either.
What kind of social science master’s would you be interested in?
@RelicAndType I totally agree that it is, the overwhelming number of people double and triple majoring there really scared me, especially when there’s so much emphasis on graduate school prep!
If not MD/DO; I’d love to study Public Health (community or global), social research, victim services management (policy or advocacy) something along those lines.
I love philosophy and I’m looking forward to my minor and premed requirements! I just really want to have options
And since most of the electives I’m taking are in sociology, I thought I might just take enough to double major, but it would probably mean overloading at least 2 terms
The answer is simple, though not easy: at each juncture follow the path that is truest to your interests.
Fun fact: majors are GROSSLY over rated for giving you option that are both good and generic enough to be useful for going multiple directions.
Yes, you will have to become employed. So use your time to get experience in the things that you think you have a real interest in. Each school break longer than 2 weeks gives you that opportunity. Term time you should be able to find research opps on campus with a prof in any of the areas you mentioned.
One of my collegekids has been reverse engineering the career paths of people whose careers or jobs she admires (and would like for herself!) for years. It is endlessly interesting- b/c not one of them had a linear path. The path makes sense only in retrospect. For an example, take a look at “The Making of an Idealist” by Samantha Power.
Also, it appears that you haven’t even started college yet. What is your info source on the “overwhelming” number of double & triple majors? If it is the new student group, be aware that what students say they plan to do before they get to college often…evolves…once they get there!
And, there is a reason that you won’t declare your major until 2nd year: it gives you time to start figuring things out with direct experience. Relax, run your own race, trust yourself.
Looking at the requirements for admission to the MPH program at Harvard (just to pick one school at “random”), it doesn’t look like any specific undergraduate coursework are required, although at least two years of work experience are:
So if you want an MPH, you would have to work at an NGO/nonprofit for two years. To do that, you want to have a lot of volunteer work at college to help land NGO/nonprofit summer internships. But you don’t need any specific coursework to do that. Honestly, a sociology degree might help a little as the NGO/nonprofit world is lousy with sociology majors, but then again it wouldn’t probably wouldn’t help that much.
Are you sure about philosophy? A lot of people are sure about it before the rubber hits the road (I was) and then drop it for something else. Analytic philosophy is hard and dry.