Final Paper：College Students Should Choose Their Major Based On Their Interests

 Introduction

“The percentage of full-time college students (age from 16 to 24) who were employed between 1970 and 2000 increased from 34 to 52 percent. It then decreased to 40 percent in 2010” (College student employment1). Some majors like math and education are easy to find a job; however, it is hard to look for a job for some majors such as art，music, and social science.  Due to the economic depression and job competition between majors, most students now start considering whether or not they should spend thousands of dollars on the field that they are really interested in, but will not easily get them a job. As a result, they are more likely to ignore their own interests when choosing a major. Instead, they tend to make a decision for their college major under the influence of time pressures, social trends, and parents’ expectations.  However, students who are major in non-interested fields are more likely unable to develop a real motivation for studying and they will have a hard time to be succeeded in the college as well as in their further career. Therefore, it is very important that students should choose a major that they are interested in since it will help them enjoy their study and be successful in their career path. 

Students should not choose a major based on time pressure

The college major decision is a potentially life-framing decision that many students struggle with. Unfortunately, most students make a lot of mistakes when making this essential decision. Perhaps one of the common mistakes that most college students have once making decision about their major is making the decision based on time pressure instead of investing time on their self-discover. Indeed, a lot of students feel pressure to make a decision early in their college career. According to Brad Williams, Ph.D., dean of student affairs at Nova Southeastern University in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, there is "an amazing number of students feel pressure to select an academic major early," (Rowh 1). Many students are really worried about entering college undecided major. It makes sense that once the major is set, students tend to be easily to focus on their study and have more time to prepare for their career path. However, discovering self-interest before choosing any majors is an important step that shouldn’t be skipped. Instead, it is a key step that students need to invest a lot of their time in order to identify their true desires or interests. As Sue Schmid, director of academic resources at Pace University in Pleasantville, New York, says "Self-discovery is all about taking risks, getting out there, and doing things to find out what excites them and what they're good at,"(Rowh 2). Therefore, many students change their minds as they learn more about themselves and the things that attracted them. In fact, "About 80 percent of students who start college switch their major at least one time. Many students will change their major three or four times over the course of a college career.” (Rowh 1 ). As a result, choosing major in such a hurry without investing time to discover self-interest can lead to a paradoxical reaction. Instead of saving time for students, it wastes a lot of their time due to changing their majors back and forth. For example, once decided to change major, students have to spend more time to retake some courses that are required by the college in order to be admitted into the major. Then, it eventually leads to the delay of their graduation time.

Students should not choose a major based on social trends

 Nowadays, media plays a big role in influencing young students in choosing their college majors. Many years ago, there were not a lot of students choose science or engineer major. But now with the rapid developing of information technology, students can easily get access to a large amount of career-related information through internet, television, newspaper, and especially the movies. When students watch movies or some science-tech TV shows, there is always a trend showing them that certain jobs like engineer or banking tend to make a good amount of money and easily to get promoted to a high position. So, it influences the young students to start picturing themselves to pursue an ideal career like that in the future. As a consequence, when they get into college, they automatically pick engineer or finance as a major without taking time to discover if those majors are their real interests. Later, once getting into the major, they realized that the courses are very difficult and not as interesting as they thought. So, students begin to change their mind by considering switching their majors.

Another question to consider is “Is it true that studying a popular major really can guarantee a satisfied job? For example, in recent years, engineering majors become a very popular major. In fact, “ The engineering technologies increased 8 percent between 1999–2000 and 2004–05, and then increased a further 12 percent between 2004–05 and 2009–10.” (Education Statistics 3).  It has a big percent increase in engineering major. In addition, when taking a look at the top majors that are popular, we can see engineering major is ranked in the top 10. However, is it true that it can guarantee engineering students to get a job after their graduation? “According to the job placement firm Adecco, sixty percent of U.S. college graduates cannot find a full-time job in their chosen profession” (Brookman 5). The reason is because there are numbers of students choose a popular major to study despite the fact that they are not really interested in it.  Due to lacking of interests, students have a hard time to build a strong foundation in most major courses as well as to go further in advanced study of their professional field.  As a result, they fail to become a real profession of the field. On the other hand, because of the high competition, most of popular majors favor students who have talents in those fields.  In fact, most companies, especially the big corporations are more likely to hire the outstanding students first. However, there are not many qualified professions who have compassion and knowledge of the field. Even with unemployment hiring in the popular major fields is very low, most companies still struggle with the problem that they can't find skilled workers, so searching for the right person to fill a job can take months of hunting. In addition, employers are likely to lay the blame on the schools because of not giving students the right kind of training. However, it is not fair to blame on the college, but the students because the real reason is that a lot students choose the major just for a job and do not have interest in their study. As a result, even graduated with a popular major, students still have a hard time to find a satisfied position in a company.

Students should not choose major just to satisfy parent’s expectation

Many students enter college with a clear idea of what they want to study and achieve, but even with the clear idea ready, some of them still have to change their mind during their college years. On the other hand, there are students enter college with no clear vision of a major and quickly pick the major only based on their parents’ wishes. Surely, parents play a significant role in the career goal development of their children. Without the approval and support from parents, students and especially the young adults have a hard time to pursue their careers in college. Even though most parents are aware of their roles and always willing to support their children, yet they don’t realize their supports always come along with the expectations. For example, some parents expect students to pick some majors that will provide them a job that have high demand or high pay. These expectations unintentionally create a lot of pressures that affect their children in making the decision in choosing their majors. In fact, “Numerous studies (Knowles, 1998; Marjoribanks, 1997; Mau and Bikos, 2000; Smith, 1991; Wilson and Wilson, 1992) have found that college students and young adults cite parents as an important influence on their choice of career.” (Taylor, Maris, and Taylor 4). These expectations and pressures lead students to accept what parents say, and pick a major that will please their parents. As a result, even all parents tend to want to do what is best for their children, but by picking a non-interested major, a lot of students ended up have to change their majors or withdraw of the colleges because they realized that it wasn’t a good fit to them. It leads to a waste of time and money and not being beneficial to the students in the long run.  Also, became overly involved in the process of choosing the field to study of their children, parents neglect their children’s right to pursue what they really want in life, and it’s not fair for their children. Although it makes sense to pursue a career that fits with the market demands as well as satisfies the parents’ wishes, it is more important for students to be able to pick their major based on their own interests and abilities. It helps students to be happier and more efficiency in studying by taking courses that are interested and enjoyable to them. Thus, it increase the change of being successful for students in their study and career path by allowing them to make their own choices to study something meaningful to them.

Conclusion

Students should take time to know more about their own personality, hobby, and ability, and then pick a major based on the true interests. It not only helps them to study better but also create the enjoyment and pleasure in their studying which will draw their mind in the liveliest way to being educated. Some external factors like time pressures, social trends, and parents’ expectation may misguide students to pick out the major that doesn’t match with their interests. However, it is important for students to understand that choosing a non-interesting major are more likely unable to develop a real motivation for studying as well as creating a hard time for them to be succeeded in the college and in their further career.

Works Cited

"College Student Employment." National Center for Education Statistics. . Web.7 May, 2013. Print.

Rowh, Mark. "Choosing A Major." Career World 31.5 (2003): 21. Academic Search Premier. Web. 8 May 2013.

"Education Statistics." Science Teacher 67.7 (2000): 78. Academic Search Premier. Web. 8 May 2013

Brookman, Jennie. "Jobless Graduates Get Money Back." Times Higher Education Supplement 1297 (1997): 9. Academic Search Premier. Web. 8 May 2013.

Taylor, Jeffrey, Marcia B. Harris, and Susan Taylor. "Parents Have Their Say...About Their College-Age Children's Career Decisions." NACE Journal 64.2 (2004): 15. Academic Search Premier. Web. 8 May 2013.