Political Science or "poli-sci" is one of the most prevalent majors in colleges and universities. If you're a political science major like me, you tend to hear a lot of stuff regrading political science.
1. "Oh so you want to be a lawyer."
Although some of us may head off to law school, most of us won't and have no intention of becoming a lawyer.
2. "So, if not a lawyer, then politician right? We have too many of those."
Again, some of us might wish to, but how can we have too many politicians when most of them are 70-year-old men who have no new ideas nor tolerance to new ideas? Maybe what our country needs is younger, more tolerant politicians who can represent people under 40. Or if you'd prefer hard-to-pay student loans while elders (the ones who show up to vote, unlike my generation) to get all the benefits from the taxes, then sure, we don't need any more politicians.
3. "Do you just study political parties?"
Most of the time we don't study political parties as much as you'd think. We look at political parties' platforms and how successful or unsuccessful they might be in situations. We look at the world and other countries' governments but we are more concerned with moves different government institutions can make, including ours, and the backlash from it. We study how you think of politics and how you interact politically.
4. "So why's it called political science? Where's the science?"
We are taught to seek out answers to questions very scientifically. We can't be biased, and must report on what we find, even if it's not what we wanted to find. We must take classes in statistics and analyze data and research. Science is the pursuit of knowledge, and we pursue it based of evidence.
5. "What even do you do?"
What do you think we do? Sit around and argue all day? We do research on big questions that are testable. We think deeply about why things that the governmental institutions do, will work or will not work. We consider the alternatives and analyze political ideologies and structure.
6. "What jobs will you even get?"
Political science majors are extremely flexible when it comes to career choices. We can get careers in federal, state and local governments. Or maybe law, business, international organizations, nonprofit associations and organizations. We can also get into campaign management, polling, electoral politics and so much more.
7. "So who should I vote for and who will win this election?"
We aren't psychics, so we don't know who will win. But ask us, and we can give you facts and our opinion based on current party in office, approval ratings and such that can predict which candidate will win. But we don't know who you should vote for, we have our opinions and we'd like you to vote for who we want. But we don't know which candidate will actually carry out what they say and be successful.
8. "Do you guys just argue all day?"
We are opinionated and ask any one of us and we will tell you how the country should run, but no, we don't sit and argue all day. However, if we argue with you, we will probably be right (or at least think we're right) due to studying politics.
