Letters to the editor

'Specialization' ignores the true point of college

In Josh Fedder's article "Specialization limits experiences" in the May 15 issue, Fedder was right when he encouraged us to "embrace our own goals, ambitions and happiness."

However, the reasoning he used to make his point jumped to a quick conclusion.

College is not about receiving specialized job training or picking one career for the rest of your life. It is about self-knowledge, about coming to know your learning style, how you think and why. Rather than remembering the detailed subject matter of major classes, we most often remember broad ideas and the skills that we developed from them.

Many undergraduates falsely believe that choosing their major is synonymous with deciding the rest of their lives. Majors are not career-oriented. So take the classes that you want. We are here to develop our learning process. We chose to continue our education, and with this choice comes responsibility. It is not the responsibility to do what our parents want, or to follow what society says we "can, cannot and should not do." This responsibility to focus on our interests and passions is our own. Four years is a long time to spend learning about something you're not interested in.

We have the resources to shape our own education and decide how and what we learn. We owe it to ourselves to get the most out of our education, not for specialized job training, but to discover more about who we are.

Mary Northey

Individual Studies: Education Policy and Politics '10