Some people believe that college students should consider only their own talents and interests when choosing a field of study. Other believe…

Some people believe that college students should consider only their own talents and interests when choosing a field of study. Others believe…

From my point of view, major choices should be based on students’ talents and interests on the grounds that interests are the most important motivators of future study; meanwhile prediction of future luxury job is not reliable at the point of entering college.

To begin with, the author’s statement relies on two assumptions. The first one is that students could only land a job relating to the field of study they selected in college. However, this assumption is inconsistent with the reality of the job market. Many employers, in fact, do not care about what majors the candidates study so long as they are reasonably intelligent and hard-working. The big-four auditing firms, for example, actively seeking non-accounting majors from top universities around the world with the belief that their in-house training system can effectively help the fresh graduates pick up technical knowledge while they work. Likewise, leading investment banks do not expect their candidates to have a degree in finance so long as they have a strong background in quantitative reasoning. In sum, majors in college do not determine the industry of the future jobs.

The another assumption is that job availability in the future is predictable. However, with the development of technology, the modern world is changing at a stunning speed which often renders upheavals in the job market, as a result of which predicting future job availability is doomed to fail. In the 1990s, the internet industry created millions of jobs, and many students chose computer science to get a highly paid job upon graduation. Nevertheless, there was a great lay-off in the internet industry following the breakdown of the internet bubble in 2000. Until 2010, when e-commerce thrived, computer science again became a hot major. This example illustrates the unpredictability of the job market. Therefore, attempts to foresee an accurate job market in the future would be more likely to be useless.

In addition, interests and talents are the most powerful motivators in students’ academic endeavors, which could lead to greater academic achievement. When students face challenges in their classes, they must have a firm belief to carry on or simply quit. While the prospect of a high-paid job may seem like a strong motive, it is actually far less effective than personal interest and talent. This is because when students strive for decent careers, it takes a long time for their efforts to pay off, though such motivation would still be an enduring one for students with financial difficulties. Consequently, the motivation could fail whereas personal interest could sustain them. Therefore, in order to make greater intellectual achievements, students should be encouraged to enroll in classes where their interests and talents lie in.

In a nutshell, I agree that students’ major might facilitate their job seeking on graduation, however, due to the unpredictability of the job markets and the efficiency of their academic study, I prefer to recommend students to choose a major out of their interests and talents.