Maybe you’re about to enter college in a month, or maybe you’re counting down the days until you can start filling out the Common App (I did say “maybe,” right?). With all of the hours you’re spending trying to figure out what clubs you want to try out for or what program you’d like to be involved in, I’d like to take a minute to remind everyone of something that I wish someone had told me. You ready?
You are not bound by your major. Just because you are interested in studying one thing doesn’t mean you can’t learn a thousand others.
Your English Lit concentration will not smack you upside the head with War and Peace if you decide you want to go out for, say, the archery team. Your calculus equations will not rearrange themselves while you’re at tryouts for the school newspaper (Disclaimer: I’ve never taken calculus and there do seem to be a lot of numbers, so who can really say for sure on that one?). Your psychology textbook will not change overnight — trust me on this — if you think you may want to explore what the orchestra has to offer.
You’re at college to do things. The hundreds of blogs that you’ve bookmarked say: “College is a time for exploring your options.”
So… go explore your options.
When I was picking my major, I decided on Journalism over English was because I thought journalism would give me a more reasonable chance to get experience in my major while I was in college.
Could I write the next Jane Eyre while surrounded by Dorito bags and college students in pajamas? Probably not. Could I reasonably start getting writing experience and sample clips if I chose journalism? Probably, yes.
The point is, you can study English Literature and Journalism. You can join the chess club even though your parents want you to do astrophysics.
The same thing goes for college football teams, or music choices, or whatever else. Coming from a football town that redefines the word “football town,” I was worried that if I went to a different school and rooted for my home team, rather than my potential school’s team, that I would be an imposter to both. If I cheered for my team at home, did that mean I also couldn’t cheer for my college’s team?
(The upcoming year’s Bowl game, where my home/college team played my dream school’s team, almost gave me a panic attack — but that’s a different story.)
You can do both, though I might not recommend it at the Harvard-Yale game. You can root for Penn State AND Michigan on Saturdays. You can follow the scores for the Buckeyes AND Ole Miss. You can join the mock trial club as a Political Science major.
What you can’t do is let yourself be torn apart by the things you hope to do. Campus is a big place — you can explore as many groups as you want to with as many different interests.