College is a place that requires major decision-making. With dozens of possible subjects to choose from, selecting an area of study is not always easy for University students.
Topping the to-do lists of most first-year students are activities like “do the laundry” and “study for tomorrow’s history test.” Few include the long-term planning of deciding a major, which takes both time and research.
While students in the College have until the end of their second years to mull over possible career choices and undergraduate degree programs, students in the Engineering School must declare a major by the end of their second semester.
Undergraduate Engineering students may choose from 10 degree programs, from aerospace engineering to computer science to mechanical engineering. Some who enter the Engineering School uncertain of their intended majors may feel pressure to make their decisions early.
“When I came to school I didn’t really know what I wanted to do,” second-year Engineering student Kenny Hicks said. “After one year, I didn’t have exposure to everything.”
Like Hicks, third-year Engineering student Quyen Nguyen felt that despite the introductory courses intended to teach Engineering School students about the various fields available to them, she and a majority of her friends “weren’t really sure and picked something [they] thought [they] might like.”
“As a first year, I was in between two majors: biomed[ical] and chemical engineering,” Nguyen said, adding that the former major had an application process and the latter did not. This fact, Nguyen said, influenced her decision to pursue chemical engineering.
She said she expected more from the introductory classes to allow students to “experience what each major is about.”
Engineering School Dean James Aylor, though, said the school tries ”to get as much information as we can so that [students] can make the decision they want to make.”
He said in addition to an introductory course in which students complete a design project involving all of the disciplines, there is a course in the science, technology and society department in which students research the fields in greater depth and interview faculty members.
Aylor added that during the fall and spring semesters, the Engineering School holds open houses to provide students with more major information.
Some students, however, said they feel that these open houses are not as useful as they could be.
“The open houses didn’t really add much to your opinions,” Nguyen said. “All you did was look at the curriculum ... [and] for someone who really doesn’t know what they want to do, they weren’t that helpful.”
Fourth-Year Engineering student Kelly Schuman, however, said that although she can understand how students might feel that way, she found the fair helpful and also cited advice from older students as another source of useful information.
Aylor said the Engineering School’s major deadline is “a compromise.” Requiring students to declare their majors so early is a “trade-off of giving the students more time to understand the different fields of engineering and trying to get into the very discipline-specific courses.”
He added that the curriculum “doesn’t give you a lot of time left” for increased introductory material, and that should students decide to change majors, “it’s not very hard to do in the middle or end of their second year.”
Switching majors is not unheard of among students.
“I’ve talked to some people who have switched out,” Nguyen said. “One person basically crammed up their schedule third year.” She added that other students take summer classes.
Schuman added that students who have switched into systems engineering, her chosen concentration, in their third year still found time to travel abroad for a semester, though both Aylor and Nguyen noted that it is very difficult for students to change majors after their second years.
Nguyen said she thinks that allowing Engineering students more time to decide on a major would be beneficial.
“An extra semester would give people more time to learn about each major,” she said.
Aylor said the issue has been debated for some time. In the end, he said, the specific majors students select are less important than the fact that they are receiving an engineering degree.
He added that every discipline involves three core aspects.
“The three things we really do push are quantitative skills, the scientific process or problem solving and communication skills ... An engineering degree will serve you well in any field you study, if you’re good in math and science,” Aylor said.
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