Omegalazarus t1_j449q67 wrote
Reply to comment by ffxivthrowaway03 in USC School of Social Work removes term 'field work' because it may offend 'descendants of slavery' by wxcode
Yeah man have them get their liberal arts degree and then they can go to an engineering school and pick up the last 12 hours. I mean that's the point of a university, right? Is it a uniting force of several colleges so that a broad base of study can be completed by students who want various disciplines?
ffxivthrowaway03 t1_j46eeqq wrote
That's not really a viable strategy, a liberal arts degree is going to be missing the vast majority of high level math and science prerequisites for a lot of STEM programs, and not teach any of the entry level specialized prereqs and would add years to the program. You can't just get a degree in whatever and then shotgun an entire 4 year STEM program at the end of it, it doesn't work that way. Not to mention how valuable getting involved with the professors and in the educational community can be for kickstarting your professional networking and opening opportunities.
In that situation they'd be far better off just going to a community college with a decent program for whatever they want, getting their associates in the relevant field, and transferring into a 4 year program from there.
Which hypotheticals aside, is entirely the point - you can't just assume someone is an entitled, wasteful brat for pursuing a specific educational path instead of the one that just happens to be "free." Hell, maybe they don't want to go to college at all and want to pursue a trade? Supporting your kid in their chosen field is not "indulgent permissive parenting," it's supporting your kid.
Omegalazarus t1_j46rc5x wrote
Your point about pursuing a trade or other technical is good, but I think you're giving not enough credit to normal colleges.
Elon musk has an arts degree. I'm not using his name as some sort of "he's a genius". I'm just letting you know that his degree is highly technical, but it's also an arts degree and not a science degree. Technically it has a lot of science base.
When I went to school I got all the way to my last 12 credit hours and I had a choice between chemistry and political science. I chose political science as a bachelor of science degree. I can go to any other school I want to and do a single year come out with a chemistry degree.
A lot of college is what you make it and you can take your core credits any way you want. If you choose to do what I did and take most of your core credits in physics and calculus, then you can come out of it with a very strong basis for a stem degree. If however, you choose to go in and do most of your core credits in literature and history then yeah you're going to have a hard time transitioning to stem after that.
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