The main point that I got from Mary Hansen's visit to our class was that we might not enjoy the first career field we choose as much as we think, and if that happens we should just try to discover what we actually enjoy and switch to that. The problem is that while this sounds good in theory even some parts of her own lecture made it clear that this doesn't already work out so well. One thing that really stood out for me was the economic majors who had to cram in math classes at the last minute after realizing they wanted to go to grad school. Since Prof. Hansen said that going to grad school for economics pretty much requires a math minor, it seems like if someone decided in their senior year that they wanted to go on to grad school they'd have to spend an extra year in undergrad taking math classes first. If grad school for economics is so specific as to require a certain minor, it seems like it would be very difficult for someone to go to grad school in something not very related to their undergrad major.
On one level, this kind of makes sense. It would be rather difficult to do graduate level work in a subject without a good foundation from undergrad study. On the other hand, this makes me kind of anxious because I think there's a good chance I want to go to graduate school and I'd like to think even if I choose the "wrong" undergraduate major things will work out ok. I might only be a first semester freshman at this point but I really only have one more semester that will be mostly gen ed classes before I start taking almost entirely major related classes and it becomes more difficult to switch. As I've recently learned, if I want to double major (although I think I've decided against it), I have to decide very soon because all of my subsequent classes have to be quite carefully planned out. So despite what Prof. Hansen said I'm just not sure how much of a chance I'm going to have to figure out what I enjoy. One thing that I decided after her lecture is that I really should get an internship related to politics as soon as possible so I can figure out if it is in fact what I enjoy. If I do it next summer or fall of sophomore year, I should still have time to change my major.
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I think you make a very valid point. It doesn't seem easy at all to suddenly switch a major, especially if you are a sophomore or junior. I'm not sure what I'm majoring in yet, but I feel like when I choose, I'm not going to want to take all these classes, and then decide to switch later on, therefore taking totally different classes. All that other time would be down the drain. Not to say I won't change my major at any point, but it definitely doesn't seem as easy as she made it sound.
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