My first year in school was spent pursuing computer science, and slowly getting sick of programming C++, being taught by a disinterested teacher, and slowly losing track of the material. I felt like dropping out at the end of my freshman year. I realized I'd really enjoyed my philosophy in literature and composition courses, and decided to pursue writing as it seemed like the most important skill for me to learn, and had always been an area where I felt unconfident. By the end of my next year not only was I starting to have personal confidence in my writing, but I had been awarded a Summer Research Grant to read science fiction (Philip K. Dick and Cyberpunk) and had helped start a radio sketch comedy troupe. You find your niche in school, but give yourself the chance to find it. Take courses that sound interesting, even if you have no idea what you'll do with them. Be less concerned with what your major or minor is called and more concerned with what your are learning. My major helped me narrow down my choices as to what I would take, but I never felt forced into taking a class I didn't like. I dropped my Theatre minor during my senior year, so that I could take a course titled "Semiotic Theory and Interart Discourse" offered by the Foreign Languages department... It had five people in it, three of whom were taking it for their major, one who was a faculty wife, taking it for personal interest, and myself, who had an absolute blast getting a very individualized classroom experience where I got the chance to learn more about contemporary critical theory than I had in any of my other courses. What good is it? When I do decide to go to grad school it will mark me as a very good candidate.
Anyhow, I've gone on farther than I intended. Best of luck.
Anyhow, I've gone on farther than I intended. Best of luck.
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