College Ideas?

Question

I haven't decided what I want to go to college for, when I was younger I wanted to be a pediatrician and then I decided I didn't want to have to face sick children; it would just break my heart. I got into photography and I started keeping journals so I thought I would like to study photography and journalism.. and at one point I thought I wanted to be a flight attendant bc I like to fly on airplanes but I was like no thanks.. and I want a job where I sit at a desk on a computer or something , I want to have my own office and I like to write and help people so now Im thinking therapist ? What careers do you think would be best for mee? I don't want to have to live in a major city to make a career. I want to go to college for something that won't require me to go to college in like LA, NY, or Philly. Any ideas??

Answer 1

The previous answer was right about larger colleges and universities having more choice. But they're not just in big cities. Some are in college towns, where the students seem to make up most of the town's population! Peterson's college search will let you search by "setting," which is basically city size, along with other stuff:

http://www.petersons.com/ugchannel/code/searches/srchCrit1.asp

If you really aren't sure yet, don't decide yet. Your college -- almost certainly -- won't make you declare a major your first year. Get a lot of required courses out of the way for the first semester or two. The last thing you want to do is start a major in psychology, take 2 years of psychology classes, THEN realize you want to do journalism...you'd practically have to start all over!

While you're deciding, talk to the college's career center. Talk to the journalism department, psychology department, and anywhere else you're curious about.

One more thing: universities are broken up into colleges. Some may have a College of Arts & Sciences (psych major there) and a separate College of Journalism. Switching between them can be a little bit of a hassle, especially if your GPA is not great, so just keep an eye out for that.

Answer 2

How about combining journalism and psychology and becoming a "therapist" through a newspaper column? You also might want to search the "net" for some career interest inventories. If you're REALLY bored check out the Occupational Outlook Handbook (google for it)- every job you could ever imagine is described in detail there.

Answer 3

When you're not sure what you want, big colleges are better than small ones. They give more choice.

And here's a tip for thinking about jobs. At any job, most of what you do seems like drudgery to most people. Often, the key is figure out what doesn't seem like drudgery to YOU. For example, somebody (not you) might actually like digging holes outdoors in all weather. In that case, gardening might be a good career choice. Somebody might actually like calling total strangers and asking them for money. In that case, sales is the direction to look.