Feature Article: Are You Ready to Choose a College Major? A Quintessential Careers Quiz
Special Feature: Should You Consider Multiple Majors or Minors? Examine the Pros and Cons
Bonus Feature: Choosing a College Major Worksheet A Six-Step Process to Finding a College Major
Quintessential Site: Featured Career Web Site of this Issue
Latest Additions: What's New on Quintessential Careers
Q TIPS: Quick and Quintessential Tips to Guide Your Job Search
Editor's Note: About this Issue...
Hard to believe that it has been almost two years since The Complete Idiots Guide to Choosing a
College Major, authored by our fearless leader, Dr. Randall Hansen, has been published. We've beefed
up our content on choosing major since then, but this is the first time we've devoted an entire issue
of QuintZine to this important topic.
We offer Dr. Hansen's quiz to test students' readiness to choose their major, his worksheet
for deciding on a major, and an article by new contributor Sharon Jones on the pros and cons
of multiple majors.
--Katharine Hansen, Ph.D., Master Resume Writer, Credentialed Career Master,
Certified Electronic Career Coach, and editor at
kathy@quintcareers.com
Feature Article: Choosing Major Quiz
Are You Ready to Choose a College Major? A Quintessential Careers Quiz
by Randall S. Hansen, Ph.D.
Choosing a college major is a major event in the life of a student.
This assessment is all about determining how ready you are to choose a college major, examining personal
interests, career and job choices, family influences, graduate school plans, and other key factors.
Have Your Resume Ready in Case of Job Loss in the Current Economic Climate.
QUINTESSENTIAL RESUMES AND COVER LETTERS provides solutions
with unmatched quality in the areas of career planning, professional resume writing, and interviewing, having
successfully helped tens of thousands of clients, from executives through individuals beginning a career,
succeed in their career goals.
Should You Consider Multiple Majors or Minors? Examine the Pros and Cons
by Sharon Jones
U.S. Department of Education statistics reveal an 85 percent increase in the number of college students
earning multiple majors in the last 10 years. While some academic administrators believe that the trend reflects
resume-building during a difficult job market, some students are showing foresight by preparing for multi-disciplinary
careers. A student with a double major in biology and philosophy earned a two-year fellowship in bioethics
by the National Institutes of Health. He plans to attend medical school after completing this training.
One of the greatest stressors for college-bound high-school students -- as well as for some college
students -- is choosing a college major. Deciding your major (and minor) is a life decision, and one
that can have an impact on your plans beyond college -- either for your career or for continued
studies in graduate school.
Zen College Life's purpose is to help college students "enrich the college experience through achieving a
higher level of consciousness, productivity and organization, to understand health and fitness,
and to move through college with a goal-oriented mindset."
The blog covers such topics as technology, education,
health, happiness, building relationships, motivation,
life hacks, and "good ole tips to do well in college."
Other areas include finances, relationships, reviews, self-improvement, and simplicity.
The site offers a series called "Start College The Right Way" to help
students make the transition from high school to college smoothly.
Find Your Career Future. Learn More About Yourself
Career Maze is designed to help every job seeker, at every level, make smarter
career choices. Individualized to reflect your unique personality and written in
"plain English," it is thorough and easy to complete.
Once completing the assessmemt, your 2-part report includes:
A specific, career-relevant discussion of your workplace personality
A list of job types compatible with your personality
Career Maze encourages you to think about tapping your full potential to find your future.
American School Search --
where college-bound students can search more 7,000 colleges with student body figures, financial aid information,
degree program listings, enrollment requirements, loan information, location details, and a link to the school's
Website. You can search for college and universities by name, state, degree program. No cost.
FindTuition.com -- a scholarship and
financial aid site for college students, which provides a free scholarship search tool (with more than $7 billion
in scholarships and grants) providing you the ability to search, research, target, and manage scholarship
opportunities via specific college, athletic, and major targeted searches. No cost to students.
What's Next -- a site for job-seekers
considering a career change, where you can find inspiring stories of people who have reinvented themselves, tools for
understanding how your strengths and interests can translate into a new field of work, and in-depth guides on specific
careers. Special emphasis on folks who are in mid-career or approaching retirement and looking for what's next.
No cost to job-seekers.
WorkingCouples.com -- a job site for working
couples (husband/wife teams, parent/child, friend/friend, significant others) seeking employment together. Job-seekers
can search or browse job postings, post your resume, register for email updates, and find useful articles.
No cost to job-seekers.
Find even more career and job site additions to Quintessential Careers by visiting our
Latest Additions section.
Q TIPS:
Quick and Quintessential Tips to Guide Your Job Search and Work Life
According to recent data from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, today only 71 percent of students earn a
high-school diploma; fewer than six in 10 minority students graduate with their peers; and many graduates are
unprepared for college. The Foundation says that "success in the 21st century demands skills, attitudes, and abilities
that require more than a high-school diploma. Yet today only about half of all Americans have a college degree or
certificate, a number that drops to about 20 percent for Hispanics and
African Americans." It is no longer enough to say more young people are accessing college. The Foundation has set a goal
to double the number of young people who earn a postsecondary
degree or certificate by the time they reach age 26. The "Postsecondary Success" plan points out that while the
rate of high-school graduates going to college continues to rank among the highest in the world, most students
will never complete college. Only about half of U.S. college students graduate within six years. The rate for
low-income students is closer to 25 percent, and only about 20 percent of African-Americans and Hispanics
aged 25-34 have earned some kind of postsecondary degree. Among community-college students, the
graduation rate is estimated to be 38 percent. Source: Sloan Career Cornerstone Center
As part of President Obama's "New Energy for America" plan, the Administration will provide the
opportunity for thousands of American students to pursue careers in science, engineering, and entrepreneurship
related to clean energy. These young men and women will invent and help commercialize advanced energy
technologies such as efficient and cost-effective methods for converting sunlight to electricity and fuel, carbon
capture and sequestration, stationary and portable advanced batteries for plug-in electric cars, advanced
energy storage concepts that will enable sustained energy supply from solar, wind, and other renewable energy
sources, high-efficiency deployment of power across the so-called "smart grid" and carbon-neutral commercial
and residential buildings.
Among the efforts recommended include individual fellowships to graduate students involved in
clean-energy research, integrative graduate training programs involving
clean energy, research experiences for undergrads in energy, and education to improve education for young
Americans who will become technicians in clean-energy fields, focusing on two- and four-year college programs.
Find out more about careers in science and engineering.
Did you know that 59 percent of new nurses and many other new health-care workers are educated at community
colleges? The healthcare industry will generate 3 million new wage and salary jobs by 2016, more than any other industry
-- and most workers have jobs that require less than four years of college
education. Healthcare includes a wide range of professions such as allied health, medical technology, medicine, and nursing.
Within these broad categories are dozens of interesting career paths. While some fields in heathcare, such as pharmacists,
physicians, and surgeons require advanced degrees, other career paths in healthcare require associate degrees that can be completed
in two years and are often offered at community colleges.
For example, a physical-therapist assistant helps physical therapists to provide treatment that improves patient mobility, relieves pain, and
prevents or lessens physical disabilities of patients. They generally prepare by earning an associate degree from an accredited physical therapist
assistant program, many of which are offered at community colleges.
Quintessential Careers Press Announces Our Latest Book: The Quintessential Guide to
Job Search 2.0: Advancing Your Career Through Online Social Media.
The
Quintessential Guide to Job Search 2.0: Advancing Your Career Through Online Social Media,
by Katharine Hansen, Ph.D., and Randall S. Hansen, Ph.D., provides six chapters to guide you
through the next revolution in online job search. Since job boards, vestiges of the first
revolution in online job search, should still be part of the job-seeker's toolkit, this
book helps you navigate those while also considering the future of job boards. The book
looks at building your personal brand, teaches you to make the most of social-media venues
in the job search, guides you in creating a digital presence, suggests you consider blogging,
and discusses ways to integrate multimedia elements into your job search.
Follow QuintCareers; Read the Latest Advice
Follow QuintCareers Latest Job Tips and Career News on Twitter
Also follow @KatCareerGal for regular career-related tweets.
QuintCareers Network of Empowering Blogs
What are QuintCareers empowering blogs?
The Career Doctor Blog:
Especially for those who miss our former regular feature, Ask the Career Doctor, this blog each day features a question and answer from The
Career Doctor, Randall S. Hansen, PhD.
If your school, organization, business or other
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appreciate it. If you don't have a link to us, please
send a request to your site's Webmaster to establish a
link to Quintessential Careers. Thanks so much!
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QuintZine: Topics in Upcoming Issues
WATCH FOR feature articles on these topics in upcoming issues of QuintZine:
* Job Action Day 2009
* How Job Search is Like Online Dating
* The Confidence Factor
* Green Jobs
* De-Stressing Before an Interview
* More Cover-Letter Components
* Finding Your First Real Job
* Empty Nest Job-seekers
* How to Stay Motivated at Work
* Quintessential Career Profiles of YOU, our readers
* Q&As with well-known career experts
* Book reviews
. . . and much, much more...
