In high school, the pressure to decide which college we’re going to attend and which major we’re going to pursue hits hard. Parents and family members, teachers, friends, and even strangers all have opinions about what each generation should do with their lives. Without having moderate experience in any given field, it’s hard to choose which direction we should take each of our lives and we're often stuck at the fork in the road. Some people choose what they major in based off of what their family tells them to do, a family trade, or by trial and error in their first few semesters in college. Some of these majors are considered prestigious majors because of the amount of respect and potential incomes that come from them. Other majors are mocked and considered illegitimate because their occupational outcome and income potential doesn’t match that of the prestigious majors and occupations. We need to stop telling people their choices are illegitimate just because they don’t agree with popular beliefs. 

Prestigious majors and occupations include but are not limited to: medical related fields, business related fields, and law related fields. These are all spectacular fields to go into because they yield favorable outcomes. Medical professionals help people live longer lives. Businessmen and businesswomen own businesses, manage businesses, account for the businesses, and so forth. Lawyers help do what is just in right in society. The people who pursue these fields go through tremendous educational and occupational workloads, and they deserve the attention and respect that they already receive.  While these majors are deserving of the praise they receive, their praise should not require bashing of other fields of study and work. 

Less prestigious majors and occupations include but are not limited to: art, theatre, English, journalism, psychology, sociology, music, and education. People pursuing these majors and occupations receive the most backlash from parents, peers, and strangers. I’ve overheard numerous times that there’s more time to choose a different major, that some degrees are Mrs. degrees, and that certain majors’ curriculum are not as challenging as medical related curriculums or law related curriculums. I’ve also overheard suggestions that students are wasting money by attending college for such degrees. While these comments could just be easily blown off, the repetition of these statements places difficult situations on people going into these fields. An artist’s precision in painting isn’t compared to a doctor’s precision in surgery, but they seem to be judged as if they were perfectly related when going through school. 

While prestigious occupations are incredibly important, they would hardly exist without some of the lesser thought of fields. Educators in most states are severely underpaid, but without them, no one could help us achieve statuses of doctors and lawyers. If people ceased to create art, waiting rooms of doctors’ offices would lack modern-day art and music, and advertisements of any sort would be dull. Although “illegitimate” fields may not feel important to everyone, they are in a lot of ways, and they are utilized by even the most elite of individuals. We need to stop telling people their choices are illegitimate because people and their passions should always be encouraged.