Time to start thinking about college

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

On majors Gwen is 11 and they are already pressuring kids to start planning.

I find that insane. You can't expect an 11 year old to know and plan what they want to do for the rest of their lives.

I'm still working in my major but it's completely different work than I intended to do with it. Given life experience I'm not sure I'd pick this major again but what 18 year old can predict the job market 20 years later?

Not to mention industry changes. Now I'd go for biostatistics but that field was barely in its infancy when I was in college.

Gwen and I talk. I don't expect her to have her life mapped out by college. I do expect her to take advantage of the IWCC program that allows her to graduate with an AA at the same time as HS.

I would like her to have some idea where she wants to end up but we're expected to work now well into our 70s. The job market changes way faster than that. I'm not going to bind her to a major that is currently hot because by the time she graduates who knows.

I'd like her to be more well rounded than me so she won't have as hard a time pivoting and adapting.

I drank the have your entire life mapped out Kool aid and while this may have worked when you joined a company and didn't leave till you retired I think it's worthless in a world where on average you hop every 5 years.

Having education that can move with the flow is more important and I think it's way overdue that our education starts reflecting that.

[giramomma]

Jun 11, 2022 10:34:45 GMT -5 NomoreDramaQ1015 said:

I would like her to have some idea where she wants to end up but we're expected to work now well into our 70s. The job market changes way faster than that. I'm not going to bind her to a major that is currently hot because by the time she graduates who knows.

Do you really think that? Especially with life expectancy declining?

[Deleted]

Jun 11, 2022 10:34:45 GMT -5 NomoreDramaQ1015 said:

I would like her to have some idea where she wants to end up but we're expected to work now well into our 70s. The job market changes way faster than that. I'm not going to bind her to a major that is currently hot because by the time she graduates who knows.
<snip>

Having education that can move with the flow is more important and I think it's way overdue that our education starts reflecting that.

I agree to a certain extent.  I went to the U. of Cincinnati, which has an excellent Engineering school and I knew plenty of engineers.  When I started at UC as a Math major engineers were losing jobs and there was decreasing demand.  By the time I graduated they were banging down the doors of Engineering majors.  Petroleum Engineering is a really good example.  Either the price of gas is up and the oil companies are paying new grads $80K/year or the price of gas is down and they're letting them go and not hiring.  The actuarial field gained MANY good people who fled from Engineering!

You still need to look at what's marketable.  My brother knows a woman with a degree in Underwater Archaeology.  Yeah, that's a real field.  She has some job working for the city and complains all the time about how broke she is.  There are fewer jobs out there for majors in English, Classics and Art History than Math, Engineering and IT- but your heart has to be in it and you have to be ready to pivot in your career.

IT, of course, is a perfect example of the need to continue learning during your career.  I used to be very good at coding Fortran and Basic.   I doubt that would impress a potential employer now.

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

Jun 12, 2022 8:29:11 GMT -5 giramomma said:

Jun 11, 2022 10:34:45 GMT -5 NomoreDramaQ1015 said:

I would like her to have some idea where she wants to end up but we're expected to work now well into our 70s. The job market changes way faster than that. I'm not going to bind her to a major that is currently hot because by the time she graduates who knows.

Do you really think that? Especially with life expectancy declining?

That might be the cynic in me. After all I picked a shit major according to YM so even though I followed all the other approved rules for going to college I still failed.

I certainly don't make what a lot of people on here consider a good salary but I own my house, pay my bills, save for retirement.

Maybe not work till you are 70 then but still you are in the job market an awful long time isn't 11 a tad young to be expected to plan it all?

I know it's the schools doing it because come high school they can brag about how many kids are alledgedly on the college track.

IDK my thoughts on it all are evolving and I'm starting to fear the clock ticking.

I read a meme that said it's crazy we expect 18 year olds to make major education and finanicial decisions when a month ago they had to ask permission to go to the bathroom.

I am all for public education and get college is required for pretty much any job.

I just feel our current set up is outdated and with the world in flux asking 11 year olds to have a major is a pointless thought excerise right along with me giving in to thinking about all the strings I plan on attaching.

I want her to at least have my experience in the back of her head. I would have been some of yalls dream child for how perfectly I laid out and executed everything. That didn't stop my field from tanking shortly after I graduated.

I am still employed and don't consider my degree worthless even though I let myself get frustrated sometimes. So if the end goal was just employment in some fashion I won.

If it was lots of jobs available, a hot market and high salaries I missed by a long shot.

College is too expensive to go for the sake of going but to me asking 11 year olds to.start planning is shaking a magic 8 ball.

Especially today who the hell knows how the world is going to turn out in 7 years.

We save, we talk theoretically but I tell her don't put that much weight into the school system's plans right now.

[minnesotapaintlady]

I think it's something like 40% of all college freshman start out as undeclared, so there are plenty of kids at 18 that have no idea.  Also, I don't think the schools are saying you have to choose the career you'll do for the rest of your life, but maybe get some ideas of how you want to start out so you don't graduate high school and are completely "I dunno...keep working at Target and hang out with my friends I guess".

I was managing a race/show horse facility in my early 20's and pre-med at college.  LOL  After that My ex and I were going to go off to grad school together, he had majored in math and education and wanted to teach college, then he got a great job offer in IT and I started working in electronics manufacturing and everything took an about face.  Lots of people change careers several times.  My dad went from being in the Army to working for the corps of engineers to being a crane operator installing wind turbines.  My nephew got his law degree, then went in the military so they'd pay for him to get his MD.  Now he represents doctors in malpractice suits.

[azucena]

Drama - if I may, I think you're a bit too in your head about this topic. I'd venture to say that most of YM admires what you've accomplished thru the rotten luck you've been given (and most of it truly is luck and not stuff that you could have avoided). You continue to push thru for your family. You've gotten yourself out of some craptastic employment situations. You manage your family finances for success. You work so hard to balance out your DHs side of the equation. And most important of all, you set a great example for your daughters and you don't avoid talking to them about the hard stuff.

Can you take a step back for Gwen? 11/12 is when kids start to notice and understand careers and how they align with their own interests and academic strengths. It's less about choosing and more about exploring and beginning to think- Hey, I'm good at math, taking advance math classes, what jobs could that mean?

[azucena]

Hoping it's clear that I'm speaking kindly bc I'm a fan of yours. Just a bit ahead in parenting as I just coached mine thru fresh classes.

She's reader/writer so sticking middle of the road math, science, history, tested into honors English, Spanish elective (which I'm hoping she will excel too), Theater elective (her passion, hard for me to support that as a career choice, trying to step back and let that work itself out). I did push her to try Journalism - to see if that type of writing appeals to her, bc she's likely to find like minded friends there, and I've heard the teacher is phenomenal.

I'm going to have to be conscious that my hs experience working extremely hard to excel to earn merit scholarships to pay for school bc my parents were poor isn't going to be her experience. I don't wish that kind of pressure on anyone, but I fear that today's competitive pressure is even tougher.

Meanwhile, my salary means we won't get any financial aid so merit almost becomes more important. And we haven't saved anything specifically for college bc I haven't been a high earner very long and we purposely prioritized retirement over college. And after learning that she can only take 5k in loans in her own name, our plan of having her be entitely financially responsible and then helping payoff on the backend isn't going to work quite the way I want it to.

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

Jun 12, 2022 9:59:14 GMT -5 azucena said:

Drama - if I may, I think you're a bit too in your head about this topic. I'd venture to say that most of YM admires what you've accomplished thru the rotten luck you've been given (and most of it truly is luck and not stuff that you could have avoided). You continue to push thru for your family. You've gotten yourself out of some craptastic employment situations. You manage your family finances for success. You work so hard to balance out your DHs side of the equation. And most important of all, you set a great example for your daughters and you don't avoid talking to them about the hard stuff.

Can you take a step back for Gwen? 11/12 is when kids start to notice and understand careers and how they align with their own interests and academic strengths. It's less about choosing and more about exploring and beginning to think- Hey, I'm good at math, taking advance math classes, what jobs could that mean?

That's more what I've been dicussing with her. That and how the "career test" they give hasn't apparently changed since I took it in the 90s beyond being online now.

It is as unrealistic and sexist as ever.

She's leaning towards tattoo artist which I'm cool with. With IWCC offering its dual program and having reciprocity agreements with the major state schools she could totally dual or switch majors because the prereqs all line up now.

She wouldn't be realistically able to pivot to things like pre med track or engineering without possibly a 5th year but lots of other majors would be up for grabs.

We fully expect her to seize that opportunity. It's a no brainer on a cost level and would allow her time to explore for no to little cost.

Gwen won't have my experience either. Things have totally changed transfer wisebwhich I had no choice due to cosf.

She can do it to exp3 and ger ahead. There are resources to help now at every school.

And she has money my inlaws set aside. We are not my grandma who didn't let me know or have the funds until I had already signed with Simpson. If I had known upfront I could have looked again at the state schools. I do not regret my education at Simpson. I gst annoyed I was expected to make decisions without all the variables.

We won't do that to the girls.

I mainly don't want them falling into my trap. I was so "mature" and "had my shit together" that I kept pushing myself down the very narrow path I chose because I was eating up the praise for how I was doimg it all right.

A few people saw the box I was putting myself into and tried to advise me but I didn't listen.

It has caused quite an existenal crisis as I have gotten older and slowly that path was closed off.

I want them to be more open minded than I was. Have some idea direction in mind but be adaptable.

[geenamercile]

I think one of the reasons middle school students are being asked to think ahead is more of an idea for high school electives than for planning the rest of your life deal.  High schools now have so many different types of electives that they can test things out.  Cooking was not on the oldest radar until she did the elective for it, loved it and started the Culinary Arts Program with the high school.  Going into 11th grade she is about being a chef, but she will also finish the Culinary art program in 11th grade, which means senior year out of 8 classes to take, she has 2 she has to take and the other 6 will be electives.  She is going to have to try something new, and I will not be surprised if that changes her mind, I will not be surprise if it stays the same either.