Oh, I seriously believe there are people on CC who would do, say, the structural engineering to build a theatre or an art gallery, and then be completely puzzled by the idea that not all theatre or music or art majors work at Starbucks.
Do these people not see advertising of any sort?
@Pizzagirl - Yes.
However, biology is by far the most popular of the STEM majors. Someone relying on the mistaken assumption that “all STEM majors have good job prospects” to major in biology may be disappointed in the end.
Someone picking s STEM major when they don’t actually like STEM will be disappointed, too. I don’t get what’s so hard about the concept that different majors suit different people.
I like it when somebody said they must have stupid mothers. Maybe that’s the reason. 
@ucbalumnus - Biology and Chemistry have traditionally been the gateway paths for pre-med students. I would think the majority of bio and chem undergrads started in pre-med, then washed out along the way.
The poor prospects for Bio and Chem majors is one of the reasons med schools are telling potential doctors that they do not have to study a hard science in preparation for med school, and they are pushing pre-meds to study other subjects outside the bio-based core.
No, I don’t think that’s it Zin. Wouldn’t mind a reference. All potential med students have to prepare in math-sci. What schools have found is, along with the required pre-med courses, other majors can yield thinking and analytical strengths that serve med students well (as well as satisfaction.)
@lookingforward - You can look up the websites yourself, but the articles I have have read suggest that currently more than half of all current med school students are biology majors, and while significantly less than a fourth of med students are in non-STEM fields. One of the reasons for the popularity of biology is that the pre-med track fulfills most of the requirements for the degree, so it is relatively easy for a pre-med track student to complete a few more upper division classes and get the degree.
No, I said the most lucrative STEM majors are engineering and computer science. Of payscale.com’s list of the 19 most highly paying mid-career (10 years out) majors, 15 are various klnds of engineering, and 3 are computer science, either straight-up computer science or computer science combined with something else. Two forms of applied math also make that list, #3 actuarial math and #20 general applied math. The only pure sciences to make that list are physics at #16 and cognitive science at #20; government at #20 ($102K) ties with cognitive science and is only slightly below physics ($106K).
I stand by my point. The “S” part of STEM is generally not as lucrative as the “E” part or the computer science part of “T.” Blanket statements that STEM majors lead to well paying jobs are highly misleading and potentially poisonous. And I also dispute the assertion that the numerous bio majors out there are all pre-med washouts. I’ve personally known dozens of kids who elected to major in biology harboring no illusions about getting into medical school; they chose to study biology simply because they liked the subject, in many cases they believed it was easier than physics or chemistry (often because that was their experience in HS and/or in entry-level classes in colleges), and in all too many cases they naively believed (because they and/or their parents had been told) that because it was STEM it would lead to a well paying job at the end of their undergrad years.
I’m not cherry-picking some obscure science here. As ucbalumnus points out, at most colleges biology is far and away the most popular pure science major, and in some cases the most popular of all STEM majors. Consider a school like Michigan State–a decent public university, but no world-beater. Fully 10.1% of the undergrad degrees awarded by Michigan State in 2014 were in “biological sciences,” making bio by far the most popular STEM field on campus. far exceeding “physical sciences” at 1.6%—and if I’m not mistaken, “physical sciences” as used in the Common Data Set includes both chemistry and physics–and outshining math & statistics at 1.2%, engineering at 6.2%, and computer science at 1%. Actually, at Michigan State there are more bio majors than physics, chemistry, math, statistics, engineering, and computer science combined. I’d be willing to bet my last dollar that most of those bio majors at Michigan State are not and never have been pre-meds. There’s a “glut” of bio majors for the same reasons there’s a “glut” of English majors and a “glut” of history majors: many students just find these fields interesting, so they pursue their passion and hope for the best on the job market at the back end. I would never criticize them for pursuing a liberal arts education in a field they especially enjoy, whether it’s biology or political science or English or history or philosophy. I would criticize those who would mislead the bio majors into believing their immediate post-graduation job prospects are better than a poli sci or philosophy major because biology is a STEM field and STEM invariably leads to lucrative careers.
Well, yes, but trivially so, since:
That’s a rather more complete statement, in my observation, wWhich includes employment at both universities lusted after by the denizens of CC, and universities beneath the level of attention of folks here. Either way, I’ve seen enough students wash out of English majors and such that I know that it isn’t just STEM.
Zinhead, I wasn’t questioning that most pre-meds major in bio. I was asking about this: “The poor prospects for Bio and Chem majors is one of the reasons med schools are telling potential doctors that they do not have to study a hard science in preparation for med school, and they are pushing pre-meds to study other subjects outside the bio-based core.”
Of course kids who want med school have to study hard science. Yes, some med schools allow for other majors and endorse them as long as requirements are met. But not because of the “poor prospects” for bio and chem majors.
It could be that the parents may have experienced better job markets when they were graduating from college, both in science and in the non-specific bachelor’s degree job market, so they may pass obsolete information on job and career prospects associated with various majors to their kids.
Sometimes, biology is among the most popular of all majors. For 2014 graduates at Berkeley, the top four majors are (according to https://career.berkeley.edu/Survey/2014Majors ):
544 economics
427 political science
424 molecular and cell biology
417 integrative biology
“Some”? Seems like they all (except for a few special programs) do not really care what one’s undergraduate major is, as long as one has taken the pre-med course work.
Also, the pre-med acceptable science courses are not necessarily the hardest ones, since the courses for biology majors are usually accepted when colleges offer different versions of math, physics, and/or chemistry courses for those majors versus biology majors.
^ Right, as long as the math-sci is met. And plenty of kids do a post-bacc. But the med schools aren’t sitting there saying don’t major in a science, the prospects are poor. Their focus is on building the best class they can. Of course that includes a variety of majors, as long as the applicants are sufficiently prepped. There’s talk that some med schools like some non-stem majors very much, for the thinking skills and rounding the kid brings. And for the whole of the U experience.
I feel like this discussion is one of the most pointless on CC. If I don’t care about or have an aptitude for STEM, of what possible consequence or concern is it of mine whether they make more money, or to what extent? So what?
My politics-loving son isn’t going to strike it rich. So what? He loves what he does. Why on earth should he care that chemical engineers make $x more? Good for them, but it’s totally irrelevant to him and his goals. It matters not whether they make $2,000 more or $20,000 more if he doesn’t want to do something.
I find the whole thread self-back- patting.
^ PG, just a redux of a timeless argument here in the CC-world. Everyone gets their shorts in a knot when the reality is we need all shapes and sizes of grads to run our economy. It’s not all about engineering. And as mentioned many times before, the really smart engineers go work on Wall Street or private equity and outearn their STEM peers by 5-10x by the time they are 30. And it’s not all about other types of majors, like humanities and social sciences either.
So since all minds are valuable, and we need people to build, people to lead, people to think, people to sell, people to solve both non-math problems AND mathematical algorithms, why can’t we all just get along???
In my ongoing effort to help @Pizzagirl reach new levels of outrage…
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-09-20/japan-dumbs-down-its-universities-at-the-wrong-time
Worth noting that the Science Council of Japan has come out against that edict.
(And forbidding the study of law? Gee, I wonder why someone who has publicly stated he doesn’t agree with the whole idea of war crimes and such would want to forbid the study of law?)
@ucbalumnus They are simply different ways of assessing the g factor. General cognitive assessments can take many forms-matrix reasoning, analogies, number series etc. , and the results would be similiar. That is the beauty of it all. SAT or ACT are chosen simply because of convenience. They are no better or worse than other batteries that I can see.
I come from a jurisdiction that do not do SAT or ACTs. The colleges have other means. Many years ago a friend told me her prof let slip that our senior calculus course is the “invisible sieve”. Out of curiosity I checked up on all the competitive programs in the province, and sure enough, that calculus course was required for admission to just about all of them. One school, Waterloo, went a step further, and asked applicants to provide results of the Waterloo Euclid math competition as a 7th credit for their most competitive programs. Interesting.
@Pizzagirl If you have bothered to look at the article at all, you would know they were talking about “the Best Person for the Job”. So your criticism makes no sense.
Laszlo Bock (of Google fame) has made some excellent suggestions for students looking for work. Here are two of them:
“I took statistics at business school, and it was transformative for my career. Analytical training gives you a skill set that differentiates you from most people in the labor market.”
“Humans are by nature creative beings, but not by nature logical, structured-thinking beings. Those are skills you have to learn. One of the things that makes people more effective is if you can do both. … If you’re great on both attributes, you’ll have a lot more options. If you have just one, that’s fine, too.” But a lot fewer people have this kind of structured thought process and creativity.
I can not agree more.
I could argue humans, by nature, are not after much more than satisfying creature needs. Logic and analytical skills can and should be taught/honed in K-12 and college. And at home. The issue, to me, is when kids get on the track of simply performing to expectations. Many get the idea that as long as they do what is required- the homework, write good papers, learn the formulas, test well- they are “good.” In fact, in my experiences with hs kids, I’d say even their ideas about what is stretch are often canned, same old/same old.
Then you put them in the real world and their eyes can glaze over. One of the things I like about the engineering mindset is how, when done well, they use collaboration to both expand ideas and test their own notions. But you do not need to study stem to get there. The logic and mysteries of, say, philosophy can be just as arduous training as stem, can foster strong analytical and critical thinking.
I sometimes wonder if those who think everyone has to study stem to be successful are themselves limited in their thinking. Yes, we have to be technically astute to get ahead. But it takes more than that, more than learning to apply formulas.