Are STEM majors considered "nerds" in other countries?

KamelAkbar
Sat, 21 Jan 2012 16:01:13 +0000

Not as much actually. In a lot of countries, as much as 70% of college students will be STEM majors. It makes sense, STEM majors get good jobs - and in poorer countries, the difference between a good job and a bad job is a lot scarier than it is in the US.

Smart kids in the US will major in Poly Sci because it’s “cool” even if they were awesome at math and science. A big motivating factor in where American kids choose to go to school is the social life at the school. Turns out, more attractive girls/guys seem to be liberal arts/business majors than STEM majors. Big engineering schools are rarely labeled “party schools.”

This is pretty easy to observe in the percentage of foreign kids in Engineering vs the percentage of foreign kids in History, for example.

Heck, in the US it almost seems cool to say you’re bad at math. At the very least, few people are ashamed to admit it. In other countries, kids of average intelligence are taking Calc when they’re 13.

I know I am making a lot of generalizations here. There are plenty exceptions to everything I’ve said.