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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Hi! I know I could get this advice from just the internet but I wanted to see if any of you had any advice suggestions on it. My daughter is interested in possibly marketing and journalism. She thinks marketing is a safer way to go but thinks journalism would be much cooler. What even are jobs in journalism that you can do that allow you to travel and learn and make a difference? Or in marketing? She is looking into what she might want to do in her future and just looking for suggestion. She is outgoing, kind, friendly.[/quote]

At most schools, marketing is going to be in the college of business and journalism will be in the communications school.  Journalism is a pretty narrow focus, and most communications programs are expanding into digital media, public relations, broadcasting, sports management, etc.  The focus is really going to depend on the programs offered at each school.  I think a double major or hybrid program across the business school and comm school sounds like a great opportunity.  [b]Throw a minor in computer science in there and you'll have a winner[/b]![/quote]

DP, not the one you're responding to. The bold above, and another PP's earlier comment about "I advise students to get a STEM minor" are simplistic.

I suspect a lot of parents on this board, yes, including parents who will insist, "But I hire people and know what I'm talking about," have no real idea of what it takes to get a formal minor in certain subjects at many colleges and universities today. It's not as simple as, "I'll just tack a computer science minor onto my marketing major" or "I'll do some kind of STEM minor with my communications major."

Those are fields where colleges often have very specific [i]sequences[/i] of courses for majors AND for minors, and getting minors in STEM or comp sci or many other fields can be challenging--or even impossible, if the student ends up shut out of some courses due to majors getting priority. And if the student doesn't have any real interest in a STEM or comp sci field, the student is burning a lot of classes and credits doing a minor in something he or she may never want to use professionally anyway.

Just going around here telling parents that their kid should simply add a minor, as if that's a simple thing to do, shows a lack of understanding of college right now. My own DC is doing a major plus two minors but that is only becuause DC's college's open curriculum means there are almost no required general education classes, so students can specialize in subjects much earlier. In most universities, that's not necessarily the case. DC has friends at several large universities who have found they can't just "add a STEM minor" because they didn't start the sequence of classes soon enough, or they can't get a seat in the one or two higher-level courses they need, due to demand from majors who need the class. [/quote]
Wait, so your point is that out of the thousands of colleges and universities in the US, it may be hard to get into the right classes to get a minor at a few of them?  And that makes my suggestion that having a STEM minor or double could help a journalism or marketing major who is graduating into a sour economy find a job "simplistic"?  That somehow it's inappropriate to even suggest that a student should consider getting a STEM minor?

Then you go on to say that despite all of your concern about whether this is a practical suggestion at Universities today, your own DC is getting a major and, not one, but *two* minors?  So you contradict yourself in your own unfounded rant?

Of course getting a minor or double takes planning and sorting out courses.  Thank you random poster with not so deep insights.[/quote]

My, so touchy. Yes, my DC is able to do minors because of open curriculum at DC's college. I was pointing out that open curriculum is not a thing at many, many places, and that means it's not as blithely easy to just "do a minor in STEM! Do a minor in comp sci!" as some PPs here were saying repeatedly. You do not want to understand that people on this forum often act like student can just tack on minors, especially in sciences, as easily as signing up for a few extra classes. Not the case in many places. Sorry if my use of my DC's experience freaked you out, random poster with nasty knee-jerk reactions. DC knows kids at big universities who are having trouble getting those magical STEM minors that parents here push for, but you won't believe that, so, you do you! [/quote]

Just curious where your child is with an "open curriculum"

It can be done plenty of places.  However, when searching/deciding on colleges, IMO, a student should select somewhere that they can freely switch majors and pick up a minor or double major.  Especially if they are entering with a "major" like communications or journalism where it would really behoove them to have a minor or other area of focus.   Tons of colleges just like that.  Yes, it rules out many larger "higher ranked" state schools, but that is your choice.  My kids both picked universities that would allow them to easily change majors and rejected those that narrowly admit to majors and make it challenging to switch.  Because more than 50% of college students change their major at least once!  
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