Why it’s okay to switch majors

How would high school seniors know what they want to do for the rest of their lives?

On average, 80% of students in the United States decide to change majors at least once, according to the National Center for Educational Statistics. Not only that, but most college students change their major, on average, three times over the course of their college career. But despite these statistics, so many students are reluctant to do so.

Leading up to college, you were asked a thousand times “what are you going to be when you’re older?” or “what are you thinking about majoring in?” and either you responded with what you thought you wanted to do or maybe you just threw something random out, hoping they would stop asking you. Even an “I don’t know” would suffice because, in retrospect, that’s actually an okay response.

The outside pressures of society make you feel like you need to have your future all set out, which can be incredibly overwhelming, especially for a freshman. But, from personal experience, I can tell you that it’s understandable and acceptable to have no idea what you want to do in college. That’s the cool thing about college; it’s full of numerous different majors, many you might have never even heard of. You have the choice to indulge in as many as you want until you find your passion.

College is meant for exploring your interests and finding something that you want to do for the rest of your life. So why settle for a major you realize you’re not that interested in?

With this question in mind, I took a walk around campus, curious to see how many students at CU switch their majors. After randomly asking 10 students, I found that at least six out of those 10 had switched majors at least once in their college career, whether it was a small change from different engineering subjects or a bigger change from biology to art. Many of them explained to me that they switched because when they graduated high school, the pressures of knowing exactly what you want to do was overwhelming, so they just chose a simple major that they were good at in high school and went from there. Then, as they delved more into the subject, they felt less interested and passionate about the subject. Sound familiar?

If so, then maybe it’s time for you to explore your interests in other places as well.

From English to engineering

I asked a few of them why they felt it was necessary to switch. Freshman, Andrew Fendel switched from chemical engineering to aerospace engineering because “chemical engineering and the chemistry behind it just didn’t interest me enough to outweigh the struggles of the course, whereas all the topics that are a part of aerospace are fascinating to me, and I’m more motivated to grind through some hard course material in order to understand those topics”.

A lot of people will tell you that switching majors also is a waste of time, because you may have already taken a semester or year full of classes for the major you aren’t interested in anymore. But, the cool thing is that by taking those classes and finding your disinterest in them can lead you to find your passions elsewhere. Without figuring out you didn’t like a certain subject, you wouldn’t have moved on to do what you truly love.

It’s okay to have a change in heart in what you want to major in. College is where you find what you truly love and it allows you to pursue it. This is what you’re going to be doing for the rest of your life so why not go through the trial and error to make sure you’re truly passionate about what you’re doing? It will be worth it in the end.

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University of Colorado Boulder