Tell me again why I need to know what I want to do with the rest of my life at the ripe age of 18? When you apply to college, you actually have to decide as a senior in high school basically what you could see yourself pursuing as a career. What if there is even more past your high school dreams? How can I know that I want to be an engineer, journalist, or politician for the rest of my life when I can’t even decide what I want for dinner? How can society pressure incoming college students, freshmen, and sophomores to choose what they want to do with their lives for the next 50+ years so soon?
As a freshman at UMass Amherst, I immediately felt the pressure to know what I wanted to become and what I wanted to pursue as a career. All my friends had long term goals, such as becoming nutritionists, teachers, business managers, and even dental hygienists. I felt like the only one who did not know what I really wanted.
This confusion about figuring out the rest of my life has lead me to an important question: why do I need to know now? According to the National Center for Education Statistics, 80% of students end up changing their major at least once in their college career. I realize college students have until the end of sophomore year to declare a major, but I’m not even sure if that’s enough time. With studying abroad, joining clubs, working, and still figuring myself out, how am I supposed to determine my forever future?
Confidently walking into UMass Amherst as a journalism major was easy for the first month. But as I took many different classes that inspired me, I honestly did not know where to go or what to do. I never had an end career goal in mind, which made the process even harder.
I remembered my mom saying to me, “Wonder as you wander.” Thinking this was so cheesy I didn’t really give it much thought, but as the journey through college has been pressing me to determine what I want to be, she keeps reminding me of this: to take my passions and put them to use.
In such a pivotal time in our young life, there is pressure to know what we want to do with the rest of our lives. What if being unsure and going into college undeclared was actually highly encouraged? What if searching out your passions in the form of courses was more encouraged than getting through your general education requirements? This freedom could actually push us to look specifically at our passions and how we can combine them into a major, possibly even creating more satisfying careers for our generation.
My advice to Collegiettes who are in the same situation as I found myself in: talk with your counselors and advisors. Specifically, talk to the counselors in areas of study that INTEREST you. If you have always been interested in a specific place in the world, I guarantee there is a course for it. If you’re a science wiz but find your mind drifting to social justice issues, take this opportunity to explore some humanities class. There are more majors, minors, and concentrations offered now than ever before – are you taking advantage of the growing possibilities to discover and learn?
What I have done is talked through my unsure situation with an advisor from the Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies department and together we broke down my passions and interests. By doing this, I could truly see which is most important to me – feminism, social justice, journalism, and communicating factual information to the public. After, my advisor helped pinpoint people in the media that might have these same passions and determined I should email them asking how they got to where they are today. Taking up this recommendation, I recently got the incredible opportunity to converse and receive advice from my favorite feminist journalist, Elizabeth Plank, who is the senior editor for Mic and a correspondent for MSNBC’s Shift. (It was AMAZING!)
For those who are unsure and undecided: I encourage you to wonder as you wander through your college experience. Are you truly doing what you love to do? As for me, I’m not quite sure what my future holds and I’m okay with it.