<p>My oldest son was very focused, so there was no indecision about major. My daughter, a rising sophomore, is the opposite end of the spectrum. Totally undecided, and starting to have anxiety attacks about it. She was considering Comparative Lit or Philosophy, but she’s extremely worried that it “won’t be worth anything”, and now thinking about a Mass Communications major (“It seems like it might be more practical,” she says, “but I don’t want to be in broadcasting or journalism.”) Anyone have any input? Would it really make much difference, between those majors? My gut feel is that it wouldn’t.</p>
<p>I would encourage your daughter to pursue something she feels an intellectual passion for. That will lead to academic success, and a career will follow. I entered college more than thirty years ago, concerned about “what my degree would be worth.” I thought “communications” was the way to go. It felt like playschool, to me. I switched to Journalism, and then to English, and finally found my stride in History. I’ve been involved in “mass communications” ever since. If you can learn to do disciplined research, and to synthesize and articulate your results, you don’t need a “communications” degree to prove you can do it. You will have already proven it with the output of your philosophy or comparative lit or history degree. You may find that you want to go on for an advanced degree in something else, and if you’re really sure you want a communications degree, by all means try it. I think you should encourage your student to approach college as an opportunity for intellectual growth and maturity, not as a trade school.</p>
<p>People, I agree 100% with what driver wrote. My D went through something similar and didn’t declare anything until the last possible moment, and, still unable to say goodbye to all the other choices, ended up declaring two very different majors. </p>
<p>She once said that she wished she didn’t have to have a major at all, and instead could have 100 different minors. </p>
<p>In any event, perhaps suggest to yours that she choose the one that is the most interesting to her, and the classes she enjoys and looks forward to most. It will all work out.</p>
<p>Driver - A great reply! Wisdom here, to be sure, an answer that would most likely take a lot of pressure off my daughter to “pick what you’re going to do for the rest of your life” at age 19!</p>
<p>Oh - I forgot to add, it’s the person, their drive, passion, work ethic, ability to engage productively with others, recognize opportunity, have a positive attitude, etc. that makes cummulative education “worth something”, not so much the name of the degree (says the person who doesn’t have a degree): it might help to give your D some examples of people who are working happily and successfully in fields that have nothing to do with the subject matter of their degrees; that way, she can perhaps get away from that feeling of “what if I make a mistake and chose wrong” etc.</p>
<p>latetoschool - very good point - Yes, I do know many people whose majors certainly don’t name the field they’ve landed in! I guess what gave me pause is hearing so many local young college grads that can’t find jobs, and have ended up very unhappily accepting very low-end jobs just to keep their bills paid. Gulp. Just a mother’s fretting here…</p>
<p>Communications/journalism major here with a 20+ year career in Information Technology. Tell her to pick a major she enjoys, excel in it, then go from there. Graduate school is always an option, plus companies are always interested in high college achievers. Analysis, clear articulation and coherent writing skills are always in demand.</p>
<p>People, someone also posted on another thread, some time ago (I cannot remember who it was, or the thread), something to the effect of it will be hard for today’s graduates to even imagine what their careers will be in 10-15-20 years, given how quickly the global economy, technology, etc. are changing. </p>
<p>You can easily see that in - when “we” were in college (o.k. I wasn’t, but in general) 20 years ago, the internet didn’t exist, there was no email, we didn’t have this interrelated global economy to the extent we do now. </p>
<p>What I do for a living (pure accident, circumstance and being very opportunistic, but mostly chasing after subject matter of great interest - I’m obsessively passionate about my work), one cannot even point to a specific major and say that’s the one that will best support the career. You could pick computer science or technology or philosophy or languages or international relations - any of them would do, but on the other hand no specific major would keep a candidate out. </p>
<p>Even as recently as ten years ago I do not believe my career existed, and I think there are a lot of people whose careers are newly minted, due to a combination of politics, economy, globalization, etc. </p>
<p>That’s what makes driver’s post is so perfectly on message - it is simply impossible to imagine what the career landscape will look like long term, therefore, the very best thing your daughter or anyone else’s student can do is choose the subject matter that interests them the most, and that makes them happy, evokes passion, etc. </p>
<p>The issue with not being able to find jobs I think is more a direct reflection of our economy, and, people are working in different ways than they ever have before. Richard Florida has a great book out about the creative class (sorry cannot remember the title), and lots of people in my age range are working with multiple streams of income. </p>
<p>As to younger people, I do think it’s harder for them, but that’s because the choices are so differentiated, and, I don’t have any numbers to back up an opinion, but I believe many of them are staying in school for graduate or terminal degrees, either as a means of staying out of the fray while the economy tries to recover, or because an undergrad degree simply isn’t competitive enough.</p>
<p>This is a subject that I ponder occasionally, now that I have more time to ponder. When it came time for me to choose a college, I really didn’t have any kind of guidance, despite attending a first-rate public high school and having parents who met at an elite college. I was the oldest in a large family, and my high school guidance office was essentially a library of college catalogs; kids went in, picked out the three or so schools they thought they might like to attend, and filled out the applications. Period, end. </p>
<p>I assumed that the controlling factor in this decision should be what career I wanted, which was a very common assumption in the 70s. The idea of being a liberal arts major was considered idiotic, among those I knew. I really had no clue, but I thought, “wouldn’t it be fun to be a DJ on a really cool FM rock station?” Armed with this, I then looked at catalogs of schools that had “top communications” departments, and ended up at BU, sight unseen. I really disliked the program after one semester, and after two, I resolved to get out. Interestingly, I’ve never heard again of most of the people that I met at BU’s School of Public Communication, as it was called then, except for Howard Stern and Bill O’Reilly. The rest of them–all the dozens of Woodward/Bernstein/Cronkite/Rather wannabees–I’m sure they’re OK, but they aren’t on any radar screen I’ve seen.</p>
<p>I floundered for a while, switched my major to journalism, and then was told by a Boston Globe columnist who was teaching my course: “you really know how to write; what are you doing here?” He was an old school shoe-leather reporter, and I hated doing that stuff. I switched briefly to the English department, but really grew tired of analyzing literature, and spent my last two years researching and writing about history. I was suddenly in heaven, but all of my college friends were asking “what the hell are you going to do with a history degree?” </p>
<p>To make a very long story shorter, everything worked out just fine, and I wouldn’t change a thing, because, you know, then my happy ending might have turned out differently. However, I still wonder what it would have been like to have picked a school purely to satisfy my own intellectual curiosity, and to have been immersed in its ethos for four years. I could have studied history at a lot of places…</p>
<p>P.S. If one of my kids ever had a college experience like mine, I would be freaking out to the max. I still don’t know how my parents dealt with it. :)</p>
<p>Just my snobbery… but I think that a philosophy degree is more impressive than a communications degree. Philosophy can be tough (at a good school); at least you know that the person can read, write, and think. Communications is considered (not just by me) to be a fluffier major. Philosophy can open up doors to law and med school (esp. law school, where philosophy majors excel); it can also open doors in areas like publishing and editing. “Communications” just seems like something that the “rocks for jocks” crew takes - in fact, I’ve never really been impressed with the Communications majors I’ve known.</p>
<p>My two cents - from the completely practical perspective.</p>
<p>Ariesathena: “Rocks the Jocks”… LOL! </p>
<p>You all are making me feel much better about giving my daughter the freedom to just find her way, explore and see where she fits. No way in the world I could ever choose that for her.</p>
<p>Philosophy offers superb training for the intellect in general, and taking a philosophy class in college is the first in-depth experience many individuals have of a disciplined, rational approach to questioning assumptions, putting a sound argument together, analyzing the root causes of positions on multiple topics (e.g., every position, whether related to politics, art, ethics, or just about anything else, is grounded in metaphysical assumptions). </p>
<p>Some students hate it immediately, others love it, but even among those attracted, many are afraid to continue because they view it as “not practical.” The natural progression is to become a professor - to get some instutition to pay you for corrupting the youth, going to conferences, and writing cool papers about the Lex Talionis or Nonbeing. To handle that, you have to adore teaching (even to the uninterested majority) AND have a bulletproof hide for those ‘polite’ professional arguments where you really learn what it means to ‘run the gauntlet of all objections.’</p>
<p>There are still some Philosophy PhDs working as cab drivers, but then, one of my friends is a PhD in Education who is a house painter, so the philosphers haven’t exactly cornered the market on blue collar jobs.</p>
<p>And you can always work in IT (the mother of all industries, with room for the whole world). ;)</p>