Resume: Graduating Early

smorgasbord
Sat, 30 Jul 2011 12:31:13 +0000

What is an opportunity cost? Do you mean by attending college, you’re missing out on 60K? (or 100K).



Well, to make 60k you’d need to have at least a bachelor’s, but it also depends on your field. You don’t need too much of an education to work at McDonald’s… however, if you want a specialized career, like petroleum engineering, a bachelor’s degree in a relevant field is crucial. People graduate early because it’s financially feasible, especially now. You need 120 credits for your degree – instead of taking 30 credits for your major and ~24 credits for gen-ed, it would make sense to double major and replace your elective class slots with something else. Credits are credits, so 3 credits toward an additional major or minor will count just as much as 3 credits for The Feminist View of Little Bo Peep & Her Sheep 101.

How does this tie into early graduation? AP credits (usually) allow you to place out of gen-ed courses, giving you earlier opportunities to specialize in what you want to do, which leads to graduating early. While your first job/internship may care about your major, it doesn’t matter the slightest once you have experience under your belt.