Sociologists and other 'Meathead' Majors

[makattak]

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304520804576345632061434312.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEFTTopOpinion

The bad choices are more attractive because they are easy. Picking not quite at random, let's take sociology. That great American democrat Archie Bunker used to call his son-in-law "Meathead" for his fatuous opinions, and Meathead was a graduate student in sociology. A graduate student in sociology is one who didn't get his fill of jargonized wishful thinking as an undergraduate. Such a person will never fail to disappoint you. But sociology has close competitors in other social sciences (including mine, political science) and in the humanities.

I'll just leave this out to tweak Carberry...







(And I'll note his criticism of economists is spot on as well. Good economists shouldn't believe they study a "science".)

[roo_ster]

Need to be a wsj subscriber to read the article.


An acquaintance (not a buddy) of mine in the service was a triple major:
psych, sociology, and anthropology. 

Hopefully, he learned some useful skills in the service.

[HankB]

When I was in grad school - returning from an interview, actually - and riding on the campus bus, a young woman was complaining that the university's placement office was WORTHLESS, that she got NO interviews.

I was surprised - I'd had several, had more scheduled, and already had a job offer or two. A few other student passengers on the bus said much the same.

So I asked her "What's your degree?"

"Master's in Art History."

Much laughter . . . more when I asked her "Can you type?" (This was before PCs, so typing wasn't the common skill it is today.)   

[230RN]

Alchemy was a science in the old Aristotelian usage of the word.  But it wasn't until the acquisiton of enough knowledge that we could develop testable hypothesis about the interactions of matter that it would be called chemistry --and conform to the more modern definition of science.

Many avenues leading toward knowledge can only be pursued stochastically, that is, through statistical testing, until we develop enough testable hypotheses to call them sciences in the modern sense.  In the meantime, folks call it wooly-headed and fuzzy.

To their own embarrassment.

I submit this from my own writings:

And here's something from William James, almost a century before:

"The  great  field  for  new  discoveries,"  said  a
scientific friend to me the other day, "is always the
unclassified residuum."  Round about the accredited and orderly
facts of every science there ever floats a sort of dust-cloud of
exceptional observations,  of  occurences  minute  and irregular
and seldom met with, which it always proves more easy to ignore
than to attend to.  The ideal of every science is that of a
closed and completed system of truth.  The charm of most sciences
to their more passive  disciples  consists in their appearing, in
fact, to wear just this ideal form.  Each one of our various
"ologies" seems to offer a definite head of classification for
every possible phenomenon of the sort which it professes to
cover, and so far from free is most men's fancy, that,  when a
consistent and  organized  scheme of this sort has once been
comprehended and assimilated, a different scheme is unimaginable.

No alternative... can any longer be conceived as possible.
Phenomena unclassified within the system are therefore
paradoxical absurdities, and must be held untrue.  (From William
James' "Psychical Research," circa 1890)

Note the use of the terms "modern" and "ideal."

Terry, 230RN

[Devonai]

E pur si muove!

[230RN]

^ But I wouldn't recant in the first place.

At least not nowadays, when the auto-da-fé is outré .

[MicroBalrog]

When I was in grad school - returning from an interview, actually - and riding on the campus bus, a young woman was complaining that the university's placement office was WORTHLESS, that she got NO interviews.

A lot of the people who "went through college and still have no jobs" are people who just are in college to get the sheepskin. They deserve no job.

I had no problems finding a job with my History degree.

[seeker_two]

An acquaintance (not a buddy) of mine in the service was a triple major:
psych, sociology, and anthropology. 

Actually, you could make a pretty good career from that....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quincy,_M.E.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bones_(TV_series)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_of_Proof

http://www.armedpolitesociety.com/index.php?topic=29822.0

[cosine]

[...]
(And I'll note his criticism of economists is spot on as well. Good economists shouldn't believe they study a "science".)

At Marquette University I had to take a class on individual and social behavior as one of the undergraduate degree requirements. On the list of classes fulfilling that requirement was, among multiple sociology and anthropology classes, microeconomics.

I took microeconomics. It was a useful class too.

[Azrael256]

I had no problems finding a job with my History degree.

Same here.  BA in History, and I have not been involuntarily unemployed for one minute since college.

It also helps to be good at something marketable.  If you know how to do something that people want done, someone will pay you to do it.

[makattak]

At Marquette University I had to take a class on individual and social behavior as one of the undergraduate degree requirements. On the list of classes fulfilling that requirement was, among multiple sociology and anthropology classes, microeconomics.

I took microeconomics. It was a useful class too.

Economics is quite useful. (And my field.)

It's not "science" though.

[TommyGunn]

That great American democrat Archie Bunker used to call his ...

Has Mr. Mansfield ever actually watched "All in the Family??"

[RoadKingLarry]

My daughter just graduated with a BS in Biology. She just got her first post college job.

Stocker at Wal Mart.

[brimic]

My daughter just graduated with a BS in Biology.

 
part of the problem is colleges/universities spend a lot of money on Biology, but there isn't much to do with it once one graduates, unless they go into acadamia or live in/relocate to an area with a lot of biotech jobs to take on a fairly menial job.
I started out with a chemistry major, dropped it, entered a Biology major, and my faculty advisor told me I absolutely needed to pick my chemistry major back up again. It sucked for awhile, but it was the best advice I got in college.

[MillCreek]

When I graduated with my honors undergrad in chemistry in 1981, there were no jobs.  When I graduated with my Master's in chemistry in 1982, there were no jobs, all at the height of the great recession back then.  I had to retrain myself in the law, since I could not find a job in the sciences then. 

[brimic]

When I graduated with my honors undergrad in chemistry in 1981, there were no jobs.  When I graduated with my Master's in chemistry in 1982, there were no jobs, all at the height of the great recession back then.  I had to retrain myself in the law, since I could not find a job in the sciences then.

I didn't graduate until '95, and it still took me 2 years to find a job in my field. I ended up at Aldrich Chemical working in their Boranes lab, doing extremely dangerous (yet fun!) stuff for little over minimum wage. We called the place, especially the department we worked in "Aldrich University," people usually worked there for 2-3 years and moved on to some fairly good paying jobs. Its pretty well known, at least in the local industry, that if you worked there, anyone would hire you for a chemistry job.

[Jamisjockey]

Conversely, alot of jobs these days require degrees, regardless of the degree.  Its the "you must be smart if you went to college" mentality, IMHO.

[Fitz]

I got my B.S. in information systems solely for personal enrichment. Same with my M.S.

They have not helped me GET jobs, but i suspect they've helped me get some raises.

[MillCreek]

Conversely, alot of jobs these days require degrees, regardless of the degree.  Its the "you must be smart if you went to college" mentality, IMHO.

I suspect this is more used as a screening tool by HR.  It is merely a box to check on the form before sending the resume along to the hiring manager. 

In my field of healthcare risk management, there are a variety of ways to become trained; there are essentially no degree programs one can go to in order to be trained as a healthcare risk manager.  So you see people with law, medical, nursing, insurance and other degrees in the field.  When I am hiring, if I am looking at two candidates: a nurse with a BSN or MSN with 10 years of bedside nursing experience but no risk training or experience; and a medmal insurance claims rep with no degree or a journalism degree from 20 years ago but with 15 years of medmal experience, I am hiring the claims rep.  So I am pretty agnostic on the value of degrees in certain fields.

[MechAg94]

On the other hand, a good engineering degree with decent grades is a good way to get looks for jobs.  You just might have to move to an area with industry.  When I say "good engineering degree", I mean mechanical engineering, chemical engineering, electrical engineering.  If you go with something like Industrial Engineering or whatever misc. degree below the majors, jobs are not so easy to find.  I did have a high school friend that majored in Mechanical Engineering Technology which was more hands on and got a job at one of the semi-conductor fab companies around Austin.  

Good grades mean a lot also.  If someone has a degree with a 2.4 GPA, they had better have something else on the resume to speak for them besides partying 6 days a week.  I always heard companies hiring out of college would sort the resumes by GPA:  3.5 or higher, 3.0 or higher, etc.  The lower down you are, the more likely you won't even get a look.

If any kid ever asks me, I think I will tell them that if they go to college, 1) get a useful degree that has job prospects, and 2) put the work in to keep a 3.0 GPA or better (the lower tier the school is, the better grades you better have).  If they can't do those things, they should really consider an alternative or be prepared to work harder to find a job and get ahead later.  

[MillCreek]

I am telling all the teenagers I know that physical therapy and pharmacy are two very hot fields.  If you get a degree in these areas, you can write your own ticket.

[Tallpine]

I am telling all the teenagers I know that physical therapy and pharmacy are two very hot fields.  If you get a degree in these areas, you can write your own ticket.

Physical therapists get to wear more comfortable clothes 

[MechAg94]

I am telling all the teenagers I know that physical therapy and pharmacy are two very hot fields.  If you get a degree in these areas, you can write your own ticket.

Can you write your own ticket with a bachelors or do you need a higher level degree? 

[MechAg94]

Physical therapists get to wear more comfortable clothes 

My employer buys my clothes! 

Of course, they are fire retardant uniforms and coveralls.   

[MillCreek]

Can you write your own ticket with a bachelors or do you need a higher level degree? 

Pharmacy and physical therapy are interesting inasmuch as up until relatively recently, both professions required only a four year degree to be eligible for licensure.  Starting several years ago, the pharmacy profession decided to reduce the number of pharmacists to drive up salaries.  So they did this by changing the educational/licensure standards to drop the bachelor's degree and require a doctoral-level degree for practice.  This has worked out so well for the pharmacists (a new grad who is willing to work at Walgreen's can start at $ 90,000 right out of school) that the physical therapists are now doing the same thing.


In the USA, all contemporary pharmacy programs offer a PharmD program as the only accredited degree that permits you to sit for the licensing exam.  This is a generally a four-year program, but usually requires two years of prerequisites.  So the typical pharmacy student spends six years in school.

For physical therapy, the entry-level degree now is a DPT, or doctor of physical therapy.  This generally requires an undergrad degree or 2-3 years of prerequisites and then three years of physical therapy school.  So the typical physical therapy student is in school for 6-7 years. 

For both programs, admission is pretty competitive these days with multiple candidates for each slot.  Having a completed undergrad degree can help your chances of acceptance.