issue 32- model essay

tesolchina_RAUID：3675555

issue 20/32/39/98/129/136
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College students should base their choice of a field of study on the availability of jobs in that field.

Write a response in which you discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the claim. In developing and supporting your position, be sure to address the most compelling reasons and/or examples that could be used to challenge your position.



In this statement, two assumptions are made implicitly: first, the availability of jobs in any field can be reliably predicted at any point in time; second, students have to major in a specific field to get a job in that field.  I disagree with this statement because these two assumptions do not hold.  Some people may argue that following the advice in the statement can increase the chance of students getting decent jobs.  I will address this argument after discussing the two assumptions.  

The first assumption being made is that one can reliably predict the availablity of jobs in a given field.  This assumption is simply wrong because the world economy is changing in an unprecedented way and the demand for talents and skills are also different from time to time.  For example, when I was in college back in late 1990s, computer science was a field with promises of many job offers to the graduates.  Yet, by the time I graduated at the turn of the century, the burst of dot-com bubbles dramatically cut the number of computer science jobs available in the market.  Nowadays, with the advent of the Internet and the e-commerce, the demand for computer science majors has rebounded.  As my personal experiences clearly illustrates, one cannot predict the future demand for any specific types of expertise.  Therefore, choosing one’s major based on such prediction may not lead to the desired outcome.  

The second assumption is that in order to get a job in a field X, one has to concentrate his/her studies on a major Y.  The assumption is also inconsistent with the reality of the job market.  In fact, many employers do not care about what majors the job candidates study so long as they are reasonably intelligent and hard-working.  The big-four auditing firms, for example, actively recruit non-accounting majors from top universities around the world every year with the belief that their in-house training system can effectively help the fresh graduates pick up the technical knowledge while they work.  Likewise, leading investment banks do not expect their job candidates to have a degree in finance so long as they have a strong background in quantitative reasoning.  

Some people may insist that by choosing a field of study based on the job prospect can increase the chance of the students finding good jobs.  It seems that, other things being equal, students holding a degree in a relevant major should be favored by the prospective employers.  One important issue being overlooked here is that students may not be interested in the major relevant to any given profession.  As we all know, students are less likely to perform well in their studies without genuine interest in the subject matters.  If they cannot get a decent GPA out of the chosen field, their chance of getting good jobs will be reduced.  On the other hand, if they choose a major based on their interest, they will more likely to perform better academically and get better jobs after graduation.  

In conclusion, I do not believe that students should choose their majors based on the availability of jobs fours years later because it is difficult to predict the job market and many jobs do not require background in specific fields.  Instead of choosing a major based on the unpredictable job market, one should focus on his/her interest and study a major that can lead to academic success.  

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