Some college degrees in Virginia never pay off. Others provide an immediate return.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes, English Philosophy Psychology History Art etc. are all needed,
but much much less.

So if you have those in mind better be able to get in to apretty selective school to be considered seriously.
Huge luck if you do those in a mediocre school.

I'm not sure why people keep bringing up Philosophy, History, English and Art majors in this discussion. They make up a pretty small percentage of bachelors' degrees conferred every year in the US. They don't even break into the top 10. Is there really a glut of unemplyed people with these majors?

The #1 major in the US is Business and Management, by a significant margin.

Psychology ranks pretty high and not too far behind Business.
[/quote/]

Alot of premed major in Psychology if they don't want to do a hard science as a major---they just take the needed prerequisite Med school courses. It also provides a strong foundation for understanding people/critical thinking and mix it with a business minor/some cs or technology courses and you are an attractive employee. You also develop good writing skills with a psych major

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I was a professor in a STEM field and I remember once when I taught a kind of Gen Ed class in the field, one of the students was a history major. This student's writing ability blew me away compared to most of the typical kids in the STEM classes. I do think there is a place for the skills that are developed by the humanities majors.

This makes me giggle because my husband (who barely graduated HS, joined the military, then did an EE degree PT as a working adult) had me help him with some of his papers while he was at Mason. Many of them were group projects. Those kids were TERRIBLE writers.(Many of them were TJ alums, too-Just throwing it out there) My husband freely admits that writing was never his strong point, whereas my liberal arts degree involved LOTS of writing. I was the annoying person who wrote all my papers the night before and still got decent grades.

Of course, my husband makes 3X what I do because he has a STEM degree. Writing isn't necessarily needed for that degree.

So again it's another proof that good writing skill is much less of a value to the market and society.

I'm not sure about society as a whole - people need to be able to communicate clearly.

Almost all universities require a writing course no matter what your major might be.

The "market" doesn't reward people for their communication skills, though.

Of course, our market is all jacked up when people can make millions as "influencers" or whatever the Eff the Kartrashians do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I just skimmed the thread, which seems to be mainly an argument about the value of various majors. For me, the real news here is how much more valuable a degree from JMU and GMU seems to be than William & Mary. I am the only one who finds that interesting? As a grad of JMU with an art history major and working in a job that I set out to do with such a dumb major and a graduate degree from a top 20 university, I do have to remind my children who are gunning for top schools that JMU is absoluletly what you make of it.

Every college is exactly what you make of it. That is why DCUM and others who are SO hung up on Rankings don't need to be. Going to a decent college and working hard, making connections, finding research and internships and you will go far in life.

Seriously, for most areas, the Elite college only helps when you are jobs searching and might use the alumni network. After your first job, nobody cares where you got your degree, they care what you did at your job.

And even there, my kid graduated from a T100 school with a good alumni network, my DH (an executive so has a huge network) connected our DC with his contacts who graduated from the same college (and are now top level execs at Top companies). They were happy to interview/meet with our DC and connect them with other people as well. Yes, some happened due to my DH but largely these people love helping alumni from their undergrad university---it doesn't matter how they heard about them. So Alumni networks are there at all universities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I was a professor in a STEM field and I remember once when I taught a kind of Gen Ed class in the field, one of the students was a history major. This student's writing ability blew me away compared to most of the typical kids in the STEM classes. I do think there is a place for the skills that are developed by the humanities majors.

This makes me giggle because my husband (who barely graduated HS, joined the military, then did an EE degree PT as a working adult) had me help him with some of his papers while he was at Mason. Many of them were group projects. Those kids were TERRIBLE writers.(Many of them were TJ alums, too-Just throwing it out there) My husband freely admits that writing was never his strong point, whereas my liberal arts degree involved LOTS of writing. I was the annoying person who wrote all my papers the night before and still got decent grades.

Of course, my husband makes 3X what I do because he has a STEM degree. Writing isn't necessarily needed for that degree.

So again it's another proof that good writing skill is much less of a value to the market and society.

I'm not sure about society as a whole - people need to be able to communicate clearly.

Almost all universities require a writing course no matter what your major might be.

The "market" doesn't reward people for their communication skills, though.

Of course, our market is all jacked up when people can make millions as "influencers" or whatever the Eff the Kartrashians do.

My DC school requires all freshman to take an intensive writing course. You may NOT use AP credit to get out of it. Then for all majors (including Engineering and STEM majors), there are 2 additional writing/communication courses that are specific for that major, so tweaked to be most useful for an engineer vs a marketing major.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I was a professor in a STEM field and I remember once when I taught a kind of Gen Ed class in the field, one of the students was a history major. This student's writing ability blew me away compared to most of the typical kids in the STEM classes. I do think there is a place for the skills that are developed by the humanities majors.

This makes me giggle because my husband (who barely graduated HS, joined the military, then did an EE degree PT as a working adult) had me help him with some of his papers while he was at Mason. Many of them were group projects. Those kids were TERRIBLE writers.(Many of them were TJ alums, too-Just throwing it out there) My husband freely admits that writing was never his strong point, whereas my liberal arts degree involved LOTS of writing. I was the annoying person who wrote all my papers the night before and still got decent grades.

Of course, my husband makes 3X what I do because he has a STEM degree. Writing isn't necessarily needed for that degree.

So again it's another proof that good writing skill is much less of a value to the market and society.

I'm not sure about society as a whole - people need to be able to communicate clearly.

Almost all universities require a writing course no matter what your major might be.

The "market" doesn't reward people for their communication skills, though.

Of course, our market is all jacked up when people can make millions as "influencers" or whatever the Eff the Kartrashians do.

Communication skills(written & verbal) are very important in any field including STEM.
That's why every good college has gen ed and writing intensive requirements.

However, wirting skill alone is much much much less valuable than writing skill + speicialzed skill.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All the none-boring, innovative, exciting, revolutionary futuristic interesting stuff are coming out of Tech. 
Most of these risk taking passionate self-made billionaires are from tech - Bill Gates, Jurkeberg, Jeff Bazos, Elon Musk, etc. etc.
Compare it to history english philosophy psychology LOL

Guaranteed Bill Gates employs English majors too. People on this board seem to think that all there is to these businesses is techies. Why are we ignoring the people that RUN THE BUSINESS? There needs to be English majors to write marketing communications, employee communications, executive speeches. There could be philosophy majors on sales, HR, marketing, leadership, reseller management/partnerships. Frankly those people are needed to balance out all the technical people.

Jeebus, THANK YOU for finally spelling this out to all the CS-or-bust dudes with a passion for gaming.

DH and I can pay $85K annual college tuition for DS to play the xylophone for 5 years if he wants. Why? Because history undergrad, Ivy law DH had a legal/biz role in multiple FAANGs that are now shaping your lives. Did you check social media today or get a same-day package from Amazon? You did, don't lie. And you can thank DH, who had a role in developing those businesses although he has never taken a single STEM class in higher education (except 1 bio survey class).

(me, I'm the journalism major/art history minor who wound up working for a chemical company at some point to pay bills. They liked that I could write and think, no STEM required!)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All the none-boring, innovative, exciting, revolutionary futuristic interesting stuff are coming out of Tech. 
Most of these risk taking passionate self-made billionaires are from tech - Bill Gates, Jurkeberg, Jeff Bazos, Elon Musk, etc. etc.
Compare it to history english philosophy psychology LOL

Guaranteed Bill Gates employs English majors too. People on this board seem to think that all there is to these businesses is techies. Why are we ignoring the people that RUN THE BUSINESS? There needs to be English majors to write marketing communications, employee communications, executive speeches. There could be philosophy majors on sales, HR, marketing, leadership, reseller management/partnerships. Frankly those people are needed to balance out all the technical people.

Jeebus, THANK YOU for finally spelling this out to all the CS-or-bust dudes with a passion for gaming.

DH and I can pay $85K annual college tuition for DS to play the xylophone for 5 years if he wants. Why? Because history undergrad, Ivy law DH had a legal/biz role in multiple FAANGs that are now shaping your lives. Did you check social media today or get a same-day package from Amazon? You did, don't lie. And you can thank DH, who had a role in developing those businesses although he has never taken a single STEM class in higher education (except 1 bio survey class).

(me, I'm the journalism major/art history minor who wound up working for a chemical company at some point to pay bills. They liked that I could write and think, no STEM required!)

Cool story but Business is #1 major for those roles especially from good busienss schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All the none-boring, innovative, exciting, revolutionary futuristic interesting stuff are coming out of Tech. 
Most of these risk taking passionate self-made billionaires are from tech - Bill Gates, Jurkeberg, Jeff Bazos, Elon Musk, etc. etc.
Compare it to history english philosophy psychology LOL

Guaranteed Bill Gates employs English majors too. People on this board seem to think that all there is to these businesses is techies. Why are we ignoring the people that RUN THE BUSINESS? There needs to be English majors to write marketing communications, employee communications, executive speeches. There could be philosophy majors on sales, HR, marketing, leadership, reseller management/partnerships. Frankly those people are needed to balance out all the technical people.

Jeebus, THANK YOU for finally spelling this out to all the CS-or-bust dudes with a passion for gaming.

DH and I can pay $85K annual college tuition for DS to play the xylophone for 5 years if he wants. Why? Because history undergrad, Ivy law DH had a legal/biz role in multiple FAANGs that are now shaping your lives. Did you check social media today or get a same-day package from Amazon? You did, don't lie. And you can thank DH, who had a role in developing those businesses although he has never taken a single STEM class in higher education (except 1 bio survey class).

(me, I'm the journalism major/art history minor who wound up working for a chemical company at some point to pay bills. They liked that I could write and think, no STEM required!)

Yes, LA majors can go far in life. However, in your example your DH is where he is because of his law degree, not his history major directly. And you are where you are largely due to the Journalism major. The combined major for you likely opened more doors than just an art history major. Hence why LA majors should have a plan in place for how to market themselves. And taking courses in another area to help make them stand out from a typical art history/history major. And yes STEM based companies hire many non-stem people. But it certainly helps if you are a LA/non-stem major that has taken a few stem courses to show interest and build knowledge.

[Anonymous]

As a 2010 VCU graduate with a music degree, I am now EVP of a fortune 500 company where I manage a lot of Computer engineers and software developers. It didn't take me long to learn CS, about six months, to get up to speed with software. It also helped that I got an express elevator to the top because I was a D1 athlete. Some computer science jobs are very hard but most are not. If you can read, you can code.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:https://richmond.com/news/local/education/some-college-degrees-in-virginia-never-pay-off-others-provide-an-immediate-return/article_2c73cc6f-c508-51c0-8fb4-7960bd1402dc.htm

Not a news, but specifically for VA schools.

Of course CS is King.
Good luck to humanties folks such as philosophy, English, Psychology, etc. as well as dance, fine art, drama, etc.

Hasn't this always been the case? I mean, CS would have been Engineering in general, say 20 years ago.. I can't recall a time when "philosophy, English, Psychology, etc. as well as dance, fine art, drama, etc." were considered hot..

Good ole boy boomers in the 60s and 70s who graduated into economy where a degree, any degree, guaranteed you management track, a big house in the suburbs, two new Buicks every year, a stay at home wife, and a country club membership.

Yeah, back then a college degree, any degree, was a passport to a solid middle class lifestyle, at the very least.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a 2010 VCU graduate with a music degree, I am now EVP of a fortune 500 company where I manage a lot of Computer engineers and software developers. It didn't take me long to learn CS, about six months, to get up to speed with software. It also helped that I got an express elevator to the top because I was a D1 athlete. Some computer science jobs are very hard but most are not. If you can read, you can code.

Cool story, what are your classmates are doing lol

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I was a professor in a STEM field and I remember once when I taught a kind of Gen Ed class in the field, one of the students was a history major. This student's writing ability blew me away compared to most of the typical kids in the STEM classes. I do think there is a place for the skills that are developed by the humanities majors.

This makes me giggle because my husband (who barely graduated HS, joined the military, then did an EE degree PT as a working adult) had me help him with some of his papers while he was at Mason. Many of them were group projects. Those kids were TERRIBLE writers.(Many of them were TJ alums, too-Just throwing it out there) My husband freely admits that writing was never his strong point, whereas my liberal arts degree involved LOTS of writing. I was the annoying person who wrote all my papers the night before and still got decent grades.

Of course, my husband makes 3X what I do because he has a STEM degree. Writing isn't necessarily needed for that degree.

So again it's another proof that good writing skill is much less of a value to the market and society.

fun experiment, put the average Physics or Chemical Engineering major in an English major course and the average English major in a 300 level physics class or ochem. Who do you think drops out after the second week?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I was a professor in a STEM field and I remember once when I taught a kind of Gen Ed class in the field, one of the students was a history major. This student's writing ability blew me away compared to most of the typical kids in the STEM classes. I do think there is a place for the skills that are developed by the humanities majors.

This makes me giggle because my husband (who barely graduated HS, joined the military, then did an EE degree PT as a working adult) had me help him with some of his papers while he was at Mason. Many of them were group projects. Those kids were TERRIBLE writers.(Many of them were TJ alums, too-Just throwing it out there) My husband freely admits that writing was never his strong point, whereas my liberal arts degree involved LOTS of writing. I was the annoying person who wrote all my papers the night before and still got decent grades.

Of course, my husband makes 3X what I do because he has a STEM degree. Writing isn't necessarily needed for that degree.

So again it's another proof that good writing skill is much less of a value to the market and society.

fun experiment, put the average Physics or Chemical Engineering major in an English major course and the average English major in a 300 level physics class or ochem. Who do you think drops out after the second week?

That's simple---most STEM students are overall good students, they know how to write and communicate. It's just given the preference many of them would rather take OChem than a Shakespeare literature course. But that doesn't mean that they couldn't handle the course and still get at least a B/C.

Not to say English majors are not smart, but you simply cannot drop into an advanced Physics or advanced chem course if you have not studied the lower level courses.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I was a professor in a STEM field and I remember once when I taught a kind of Gen Ed class in the field, one of the students was a history major. This student's writing ability blew me away compared to most of the typical kids in the STEM classes. I do think there is a place for the skills that are developed by the humanities majors.

This makes me giggle because my husband (who barely graduated HS, joined the military, then did an EE degree PT as a working adult) had me help him with some of his papers while he was at Mason. Many of them were group projects. Those kids were TERRIBLE writers.(Many of them were TJ alums, too-Just throwing it out there) My husband freely admits that writing was never his strong point, whereas my liberal arts degree involved LOTS of writing. I was the annoying person who wrote all my papers the night before and still got decent grades.

Of course, my husband makes 3X what I do because he has a STEM degree. Writing isn't necessarily needed for that degree.

So again it's another proof that good writing skill is much less of a value to the market and society.

fun experiment, put the average Physics or Chemical Engineering major in an English major course and the average English major in a 300 level physics class or ochem. Who do you think drops out after the second week?

That's simple---most STEM students are overall good students, they know how to write and communicate. It's just given the preference many of them would rather take OChem than a Shakespeare literature course. But that doesn't mean that they couldn't handle the course and still get at least a B/C.

Not to say English majors are not smart, but you simply cannot drop into an advanced Physics or advanced chem course if you have not studied the lower level courses.

I think if you talk to college professors they may have a different opinion. I know several that have complained about STEM Majors’ writing skills.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:https://richmond.com/news/local/education/some-college-degrees-in-virginia-never-pay-off-others-provide-an-immediate-return/article_2c73cc6f-c508-51c0-8fb4-7960bd1402dc.htm

Not a news, but specifically for VA schools.

Of course CS is King.
Good luck to humanties folks such as philosophy, English, Psychology, etc. as well as dance, fine art, drama, etc.

I was an English Lit major and am making $1.5M per year now.