Some charts to check out before deciding on a college major

by Grace

Students who are deciding on a college major may want to look at some charts linked by Business Insider.

… tons of information is out there about majors, employment and earnings. We’ve pulled out findings from a report by the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce.

Some information is practical.

You can see where the men are . . .

. . . where the women are . . .

. . . and what white people like

Admittedly, not all the charts are very practical, but they are interesting.  The point is, choosing a major should involve some research.  The full report can be linked here:  What’s it Worth? The Economic Value of College Majors

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5 Comments to “Some charts to check out before deciding on a college major”

  1. I agree about the research, although I think students need to look at earnings over time, career trajectories, and working conditions. Working conditions in forestry are likely to be very different than conditions in art and music education. Also, and this means thinking about your major early, check if the school you want to go to has a strong record of placing students in your desired major into good jobs or good graduate programs.

  2. It makes more sense to do an ag major if your family happens to own tens of thousands of acres of cropland.

  3. Bonnie, those are all good suggestions, although this one seems the hardest to ascertain with confidence:
    “if the school you want to go to has a strong record of placing students in your desired major into good jobs”. The data from the college placement offices can sometimes be vague.

  4. Oh, never listen to the college placement office. They don’t have a clue!! They are the same people who tell our students wrong ways to write resumes, too.
    Unfortunately, you have to really dig. Asking people working in the field is a good way. For example, on a national level, I’ve seen good discussions of which schools the good companies prefer on a mailing list of women in computer science. It was very candid. Also, check which schools the good companies recruit at.

  5. Also, in this era of social networking, it is pretty easy to find out which undergrad and grad schools people working in the field have gone to. I think you can see that on lots of LinkedIn profiles. And don’t forget mentoring. In my field, there are lots of efforts to mentor high schoolers interested in STEM careers. Mentors can be a great source of info on how good a particular program is.

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