All College Majors Should be Treated Equally

Junyan KongLinguistic 3C; Section #4January 21, 2014Paper #1; “College”-Draft #1All College Majors Should be Treated EquallyWhen people talk about other people who are successful, an adequate number of them think of Steve Jobs at first. During his college study, he decided to study calligraphy, which may be difficult to get a job when he graduated. Ten years later, the inspiration he happened to obtain from his calligraphy classes became the key for the innovative typography which was the art or technique of arranging type in the entire computer field. Innovative typography covered areas such as typeface selection, line length, line spacing, kerning, tracking, and wider design features such as color and lighting. Steve Jobs designed gorgeous and remarkable calligraphy for the first computer in Macintosh and made it available for the Mac. And it was the first computer with beautiful typography. Afterwards, all other computers began to borrow his ideas. They used and designed other pretty typography in their computers. Hence it was perfectly reasonable that the seemingly negative choice that choosing a job which can be difficult to receive economics benefits turned out to be a positive decision in his life.However, nowadays, many students prefer majors that will prove lucrative when they graduate rather than other majors they are interested in. Practicality andmarketability become the most important considerations when choosing majors before studying in college. In my point of view, however, we should treat all kinds of majors equally. It is better for us to choose a major we are interested in. What is more, whether we will succeed or not depends on if we work hard or not actually.As far as I am concerned, we should treat every kind of major equally. My major is Electrical Engineering. But the main consideration for me to choose this major was not economics benefits in the future. I really did well in mathematics and physics when I was a high school student. In addition, I like engineering very much. Although many other majors may relate to a much better career, I prefer to study the major I am interested in during my college life. However, Tabarrok suggests that we need to pay more attention to majors related to economics, science or engineering, since with such popular degrees, students are more likely to enter the workforce with a decent wage and become able to contribute (250). Besides, with regular liberal arts degrees, graduates can hardly find jobs in their field. And in some way, liberal arts degrees have already made their investments of college experience less valuable. As Tabarrok (250) said, “Most important, graduates in that arts, psychology, and journalism are less likely to create the kinds of innovations that drive economic growth.” The STEM degrees not only gain advantages in career opportunities, but also develop great progress for society economically. Nonetheless, I believe that studies in liberal arts areas are invisible assets in our society, which are irreplaceable. As a result, we cannot just evaluate majors depending on the superficial economic returns. For example, at present, it is encouraged for everyone to protect and develop the worldcultural heritage. It is a record in history for younger generation to learn about. And it has vital significance for future life inspiration in various areas. In my point of view, although many studies like protecting the world cultural heritage do not have superficial economic returns, they are also very important and can benefit people a lot.Our society is just like a complex machine that requires countless kinds of gears to work together. We need artists and musicians also, not just engineers. For instance, Alice Wu, a film director, majored in computer science at Stanford University, but kept great passion for writing and making films. Wu pursued a career in computer science, but began writing a novel while working at Microsoft. Deciding the story would work better as a film, she signed up for a screenwriting class, in which she penned the feature script Saving Face. Encouraged by her screenwriting teacher, she left Microsoft in the late 1990s to try to turn the script into a film. Alice Wu's most noted work is the 2005 Saving Face. It was inspired by her own experiences coming out as a lesbian in the Chinese American community. And in 2001, the scriptfor Saving Face won the Coalition of Asian Pacific in Entertainment screenwriting award and she became a famous director. As far as I am concerned, majors do not necessarily decide one’s career and we should always keep options open, as life is full of variables.As a matter of fact, everyone needs a certain degree of education, but not everyone has to stick with a STEM education in order to be paid a huge salary in the future. Tabarrok (252) says, “Our obsessive focus on college schooling has blinded usto basic truths. College is a place, not a magic formula.” College is just a place for people to study knowledge and it is not a magic machine to make people be good at what they are weak in before. Not everyone is good at mathematics or engineering. Forcing themselves to choose majors which have no interests to them can be just a waste of time. It is a normal phenomenon that some students are suitable for science and some are not. Therefore, the STEM majors are not good choices for many people. Taking a lot of time to learn something hard can be counterproductive. And finally, it may make many students choose to dropout. As the author said, “The U.S. college dropout rate is about 40 percent, the highest college dropout rate in the industrialized world. That is a lot of wasted resources. Students with two years of college education may get something for those two years, but it is less than half of the wage gains from completing a four-year degree. No degree, few skills, and a lot of debt is not a ideal way to begin a career”(Tabarrok 251). Due to the high rate of dropouts, Tabarrok concludes that a college education is apparently not for everyone, but he does not further any research on why the rate of dropouts in America is so high. The main reason, in my opinion, is that many students and parents do not do their homework before picking a major. In another article, Singletary (252) says, “Nonetheless, the lack of career planning before a school is chosen, a major is selected, and debt is borrowed is shocking to me.” The lack of major planning before school selection is one of the most common reasons for dropouts. People are blindly eager for beneficial employment prospects, whereas neglect their interests on the majors and their abilities to learn the majors.In my perspective, if practicality and market ability were not factors after graduation, many people would certainly choose the majors which they liked and were clever at. However, it is no doubt that college study is substantial and challenging. It is very tough to pass a course if you do not pay enough efforts to your study, although you may be very good at your major. As a college student, I often feel quite competitive when I face a midterm, quiz or when homework is due, most of which seems to be endless. I believe that no one studying in college will feel easily when face with these situations. And at that time, some students will choose to dropout. In my point of view, most dropouts also have problems with themselves. In fact, the majority of dropouts will keep giving up when they get into a new suitable area. In other words, whether we will succeed or not in the future depends on if we work hard or not actually. No pains, no gains. No one can succeed easily without working hard.In conclusion, we should treat the liberal arts degree equally with science and also encourage it. Moreover, it will be helpful for us to choose a major which we are interested in. If so, we will not feel confused or have no direction when we graduate. But as Singletary (256) said, “I wouldn’t want to discourage people from pursuing a career they love, even if the pay isn’t very high. However, that choice should be made with understanding of which job opportunities might be available and weighing what you can expect to earn annually against the cost of taking on debt to finance your education.” Last but not least, whatever the major we choose, we should try our best before we give up and we may succeed if we can persist one more time.Work citedTabarrok, Alex. “Turning In to Dropping Out.”America Now. 10th ed. Boston/New York: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2013. 249-252. Print.Singletary, Michelle. “Not All College Majors Are Created Equal.”America Now. 10th ed. Boston/New York: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2013. 254-256. Print.。