Korean Job Discussion Forums

[The evil penguin]

....what would you choose as your university major?


Straight out of high school I went into science degree majoring in fisheries science and aquatic biology.

Despite my initial enthusiasm however, I soon lost interest and barely scraped though..... to wind up as a newspaper cartoonist and taxidriver.

After a bit of travel, finally ending up in korea...I returned to university and completed a masters in environmental science.... ending up in well paid government job as a wetlands advisor and hydrologist.

The bureacracy nearly killed me and i ended up fleeing to china (an irony in itself) before returning to Korea. Where i am now.

However, i am currently 3/4 through a second masters in GIS (geographic information systems) and Cartography... and i'm thinking i might have finally found my niche.

Maybe. If however i could do it all over again.... I would have tried harder for veterinary school. I missed out by one lousy OP mark (whatever that is in international standard).

Mind you, I'm also currently thinking i wouldn't mind doing psychology, fine arts, history, religion, or languages........ Despite a love of reading however, i never understood why anybody would want to study english literature. Or accounting...eeeuugh!! My opinion of course....

Oh for unlimited money to just study....

[asams]

I probably would've stayed with History but just tried a little harder and also added Political Science in order to better my chances of getting into Law School.

I worked in a pharmacy for about 4 years and I really enjoyed it and tried to add a Chem minor but I suck at science so that didn't work out too well. That would be an option.

I also was a double major in Exercise and Sports Science for all of a semester and I would love to coach basketball - I did go to UNC after all and we know what kind of basketball coaches that school has produced.

[The evil penguin]

[Ya-ta Boy]

If I knew then what I know now, I would have kept my history interest as a hobby and gone straight into English, joined up with the Peace Corps, and set out on an adventure twenty years before I did. Ah well.

[princess]

I would not have gone to college if I had it to do all over again. This is 2009 and a useless placemat gets you nowhere. I would have finished high school and gone straight to work in a bar, learning bartending very well. I could have been working in a high class bar in NYC or Vegas, pulling in some good coin, not 2.something, something, something in Korea. I still may do that though...I'm not 100 years old yet. Or I may go to culinary school...but then again, I don't need any more student loans....The USA and it's new world order brainwashers are a joke...Go to college everyone, and you will be rich and successful, no matter what...Yeah, right-o slick.

[asams]

[bixlerscott]

I might had picked what I really enjoy. Archeology, anthropology, or one of many other -ology sciences; not the study of money, business, math, and social sciences. Astronomy is really cool too.

Unfortunately nepotism best facilitates the transition from college to a real career these days and it's very important to get that first foot in the right entry or your degree is toast. Not to mention, those getting support also are graduating without student loans while those saddled with loans aren't doing well in the job market nor achieving as much due to not having support in high places. This issue has nothing to do with the qualities of the graduate. Lots of smart capable talanted over qualified people are serving coffee, selling clothing, and shift managing retail for $12 or less an hour.

If I were 18 years old knowing what I know now, I would had just signed up to become a military officer and get my college fully paid for as well as a professional paying career offering worldwide assignments after graduation. My enlistment offering beans for GI Bill was a severe undershot of selling myself short as I worked my tail off for little to nothing, but later realized I probably would do well and be very happy as a science officer.

[The evil penguin]

[Khenan]

I went in as an engineering major and came out an unqualified-for-anything Lit major (which you trashed in the OP). My Ed.M. eventually added some value to my original degree.

My main question for you is this: If you like reading, why not pursue a lit degree? I like reading (which is why I switched from engineering), and I found that - as in all things - studying a subject with a real teacher gives you a better insight into the subject. Regardless of how much reading I have done in my life, or how much thinking or talking about it I have done, studying it in a real classroom definitely opens doors of exploration - unless of course you're a natural genius at language and writing.

[Draz]

[AgentM]

I'm doing a degree in Political Science and Public Admin. However, there are lots of other things I would like to do in other lives. I could do Anthropology (archaeology), History, Psychology. Stuff like that. To get less realistic, I would have loved to go into some of the sciences, but I suck at math and memorizing mass amounts of info, so that's out of the picture in this lifetime.

[The evil penguin]

[Steelrails]

If I could do it all over again I'd go into counseling/consulting. Some kind of analysis, advice giving and problem-solving. Of course back then I'd "Hate the cubicle zombie land, man".

Right now when I'm 50 I plan to go get a degree in American Civil War History (My passion) and work on battlefields and such, but it would have been fun to do that in College. But that kind of thing is more for the aged than the young.

Being an Art History teacher would be fun. Any kind of higher education teaching seems intriguing. If I was made of money I would go into Equestrian related matters. I wish there was a degree for Bridge. British Lit wouldn't be bad either- Shakespeare, Chaucer, Austen, and Hardy...

But nope, it was PoliSci, which was good, but I didn't go about it properly and it's kind of wasted.

[DWAEJIMORIGUKBAP]

I'd have done whatever I found to be the best practical film Degree in the UK (not film theory; filmmaking.)

I studied BA Drama, Theatre and Film studies.

But the filmaking we did was mostly documentary (not a bad thing) and we had no good practical training or work experience or lectures actually linked with the industry, thus I was left a graduate who could probably make a decent docu with the right team and eqpt but with abso-f*cking-lutely no idea about how to get work etc.

If I could afford it and if I hadn't decided to go with writing (not on a whim, been into it for many years too) due to it being something I can do mostly by myself - I would do the 2 year practical MA in fiction directing course at the British National Film and Television School.

Shame as I showed good promise and was told by a lecturer / prof who had made films in Ireland that I should deffo go into the industry and he felt sorry for me having to work with others on my course who had no idea what they were doing etc... I had good editing skills and a good sense of cinematic pacing and good ideas.

Now I feel I'm too old / too out of the loop and also that the UK's tiny little film industry is too much a closed shop anyway.

Shame as I have only truly felt 100% alive and thriving when I was at uni shooting / editing / writing for film.

But life is not over yet at 33 yrs old I guess....

[oldtactics]

My degree is in Political Science and I'm happy with that, but I think if I had unlimited time and money, I'd go back to school for something like Astrophysics or Biotechnology. Social science was a great area of study but I feel like my 'science' brain wasn't being stimulated very much.

So much more out there that I have left to learn.