Four or five years? One, Double, or Triple major?

College Majors
1

I was recently offered a position in my university that awards me free housing. I have up to four years of free tuition (going on the third year.) I am lower class, so I am very lucky in the fact that I get a lot of government help, so a fifth year would not be hard to pay for.

I am currently a Public Relations major with minors in Creative Writing & Peace Studies and Conflict Resolution. My current plan is to take 18 credit hours/semester for the rest of my UG career. I have taken 18 hours for the last three (of four) semesters.

If I choose to go for a fifth year, I can add a major in Political Science, and keep my minor in Creative Writing. With that, I could reduce my course load down to 15 credit hours/semester.

However, I have enough room in my schedule to add another major if I continue for five years. I can add Creative Writing in addition to PR and POLS. But this would continue to require me to take 18 credit hours/semester.

I only have 15 credit hours left of my Public Relations degree after this Fall 2017 semester. For Summer 2018 I intend on using The Washington Center to facilitate an internship in Washington D.C. So my huge capstone will be in the summer for PR and then I’ll be down to just my minors.

I’m not positive what I want my life after college to entail, but one of my visions is to represent people in Washington, hence the desire for the POLS degree. I took the intro POLS class this past semester and I fell in love. Politics interests me, now more than ever.

I’m thinking about adding Creative Writng because extra classes with writing definitely wouldn’t hurt. Though if we’re being honest, I have a pipe dream of becoming a published writer. I am currently working on my third novel. My first novel, once I fully edit it (for the milionth time) should be around 65,000 words. College courses in fiction writing and literature would really help to improve the quality of my work.

This next semester I am preparing myself to join our Universities PR Firm/organization. I also plan on joining our PRSSA. I am currently the Vice President for an organization promoting Freshmen leadership. I’m also the social media coordinator for our Secular Student Alliance chapter. I realize that my extra curicular’s are just as important as my academics, if not more.

I’m not sure if I should add the other majors. I love the idea, but I want to be as logical as possible

2

You are all over the map, and imo it’s time to focus.

None of these avenues are worth an extra year of college if you have to pay for it.

IF you are really “in love with” politics, do that as your major (you should be able to finish it in 2 years), and get relevant internships.

IF you are really a novelist in your bones, take creative writing classes and get yourself into one of the prestige summer writing programs, and just take politics classes as electives.

IF you are really a PR person, finish your major and get yourself internships in that field; in the meantime take the classes in creative writing and politics that interest you as electives. You don’t have to have a ‘major’ or ‘minor’ to take classes.

Internships and work experience are way more important than college ECs, which are only occasionally more important than academics, much less equal to them (for example, an active presence on the student newspaper is an expected EC for a journalism student).

IRL your actual major(s) matters much, much less in the outside world than you think it does. Although some politics-type jobs like to see a related major (pol, polsci, IR, etc), most jobs will care more about your internships and work experience.

An extra year of college to pile on unrelated majors might well be fun- and if you can afford it, go for it- but otherwise no need to add them on.

3

^All of this. You could get involved in Washington politics with a major in PR, or political science, or creative writing - so don’t add or change your majors on this basis. Your current plan to finish in four years sounds just fine. An extra year of experience will be much, much more valuable than an extra year of college.

4

There is no need to major in everything you are interested in. I love your eagerness and love of learning. But you can progress in some of these areas outside of academia, on your own, through work or volunteering or interning or reading or writing or whatever. There are also many ways to work on writing, classes,workshops, and so on, outside of school, if that is what you decide.

I think your activities outside of the classroom are invaluable and everything will come together for you at some point. Everything goes into the pot so to speak, and to continue the bad metaphor, you have a good soup cooking.

5

I’m also an undergraduate student who would like to take a second major. I’m an international student, just started this summer. My F-1 visa limits my time to only 60 months of studying. So, I major in math and would like to get another major in astrophysics. Thankfully, I don’t have to worry about money, I got a full scholarship ( room & board included). My school allows to take 18 credits per semester & summer semesters suck because there are so few classes to choose from. I worry that I may have not have enough time. Any suggestions?

6

(friendly tip: it’s not good form to hijack somebody else’s thread, even if it is a related topic- just start your own next time)

In practical terms, Astrophysics will require a lot of math, and often you can pick up a math minor with as little as 1-2 more classes than are required for your astrophysics major. Unless you have a particular reason to ‘major’ in math (or astrophysics) don’t get too hung up on the label- figure out what you want to do, and what courses / major you need to get there. You will have an advisor to help you plan your courses so that you can complete your courses.

7

I agree with the other posters that experience trumps a whole slew of majors. Our S just had one major and his experience was the most important thing in getting a job, as was D’s. It is important to graduate with as little debt as possible. Work with your counselor to be sure you’re on track to graduate on time and don’t obsess about whether or not you get multiple majors. If you can get more than one without much extra work and no extra cost, that may be worthwhile, but otherwise, go for experience to help you sort out what you’d like to do as a career and make you more employable.

8

A MBA in political science is possible?