By Trey Honeycutt, Photographer
“Oh, you say you are a business major at Baylor University. What do you want to do with that?”
That is the question that I dread getting asked every time I meet somebody and have small talk about my major. My personal favorites are family holidays. The whole family, with all the grandparents, is gathered around the table, stuffing their faces with turkey and dressing, and your uncle looks at you and says the exact thing that you did not want to hear: “What do you want to do with your life?”
At that moment you have the internal battle with two options from which to choose. Option one: tell them what they want to hear, that you have your whole life planned out down to what kind of dog you are going to have and what color fence is going to be at your first house. Option two: you can tell them that you have no idea what you want to do with your life at this point which could change tomorrow.
College is the time in your life that you are supposed to figure out what you want to do for the rest of your life, and that can be a scary thing.
The New York Times reported 80 percent of students who have declared a major are not sure what they want to do and probably will change it by the time they graduate. This statistic is pretty close across the board for college students all around the country.
According to research at the University of La Verne, more than 50 percent of college graduates pursue careers that are not related to their majors. Keep in mind that most employers just want you to have a degree in something.
With statistics like these, why is this happening on such a vast scale to college students? Is it possible that it has to do with all the different media outlets and pieces of information we are bombarded with every second of the day?
According to The Telegraph, the average person comes in contact with the equivalent of 174 newspapers’ worth of information a day. If you think about it, it is hard enough to decide what your sandwich will consist of at Subway, let alone decide your major that will impact you for the rest of your life.
I know college is supposed to answer your questions, but I am here to say as living proof that that is not always true in all cases. At that point we just have to have faith that God knows what He is doing in our lives.
Trey Honeycutt is a sophomore from Sugar Land. He is a photographer for the Lariat.
