I think it’s safe to say that the number one question you gets by everyone and their mother upon heading off to college is “what do you want to do with your life?” At 17 or 18 years old we are expected to know what we want to do with the rest of our lives, or at least have a general sense of our career aspirations. Every college application we fill out asks us to check off the box next to our desired major. Checking “Undecided” is practically the worst decision you can make in the eyes of your peers. I mean, come on, how could you not know what exactly you want to do? With all that work experience you’ve had in jobs other than waitressing or lifeguarding and babysitting, you should have a solid idea. Forget the changing economy and ever-shifting job market, we should know the endless jobs that exist in a given field, shouldn’t we?
Needless to say, making a decision about your major isn’t always an easy one. Not all of us are like Suzy, who knew she wanted to be a doctor since she could walk, or like Rick, who had such a knack for baseball that he was destined to go pro. For a lot of us, it’s our best guess at what we want to do based on our passions. It’s a decision that is often rooted in personal experiences and hopes. Yet while we each go through this process, we still turn around and respond “oh,” or “what kind of jobs can you get with that?” when our peers declare a major that we deem lesser.
As an Undecided major at Fordham last year, and an ILR’ie here at Cornell, I’ve gotten both the horror at my choosing no major at all and the looks of superiority over my “I Love Reading” major. Being Undecided allows somebody time to experiment with a lot of fields and not pigeon hole themselves into a set subject just yet. Why do you think most colleges require majors be declared in sophomore year? And why is it more acceptable for an incoming Finance major to switch majors approximately 5 times, but less okay for an Undecided major to wait it out and pick one major and stick with it?
And yes, my ILR major may be easier than the Engineering majors here, I’m not denying that. But, just because I don’t spend hours doing extensive problem sets or pouring over physics I will never understand does not mean my major is less significant or something that won’t provide a platform for my success. Sure, I’m not going to be the next doctor or work for NASA, but I can still be successful and love what I do. Each major helps set you toward certain jobs, and if we all decided to major in those “superior” and “bread winning” majors, we would have a lot of empty jobs for a lot of the humanities.
Ranking one major against another is like comparing apples to oranges, and is just a moot point. We’re all doing our best to capitalize on our skills and our passions, and there’s no need to major-shame one another in the process. After all, we’re all able to answer the “what do you want to do with your life?” question in our own way, and that’s all that matters.
