» Sat Jul 30, 2011 1:05 am So far, I haven't visited a single university or college as I have no idea which to visit because I don't know what type of opportunities I'm looking for. Just a couple weeks ago, I have an idea, more-or-less, of what a finished copy of the transcript I will be using to apply to apply to wherever I apply (excludes senior year grades and any possibly higher grades I may receive when I take my SAT and ACT again in the fall... which I have chosen to retake simply for the sake of trying to get better scores and because they still may make it on to the transcript I use to apply, just in time.).
My grade-point average will be either an 88 or, more likely, an 89, my SAT score is 2010 (combining all three scores) and either a 1330, 1340, or 1350 (two-score system... not sure which two of the three scores are the ones counted, though, so any of those three values may be the correct one). and my composite ACT score is a 28 (which roughly translates to the equivalent of a 1250 for a two-score SAT grade; schools typically only look at the higher of the two tests). I've got some AP (advanced placement) credit (a 4 on my AP world history and my AP U.S. history exams) and currently have some valid ACE credit (I also took the AP exam for this particular course, which is ACE Biology, just in case ACE credit wouldn't count where I wanted to apply, which is still unknown, and I got a 3, so I'm not sure what good that will be.).
By the end of my senior year, I will have also taken and completed an ACE Drugs course (I was running out of options for classes to take and this seemed interesting. :shrug:.), an AP Government and Politics course, and AP English 12 course and although I didn't have an exam specifically for it, I took an AP English 11 course this previous school year.
Overall, my grades, although admittedly having suffered a bit from "I'm lazy" syndrome, are pretty good, as far as I can tell, but I'm not sure just how good. Anyway, although I didn't really think it would actually happen, entirely, I was hoping that by the time I had my GPA mostly figured out and had gotten my SAT/ACT results back that something would have just snapped and let me know what I want to do, but I've got nothing. I don't have any family members who can help me out with this from experience and I've got a lot of factors I have to take into account whereas my mother did not and mostly just fear. I'm pretty sure I'm behind on the "tour some schools and choose your major" aspect of college planning and simply sitting around thinking about it isn't helping, so I needed to really talk to someone about this and so I'm bothering the good people of these forums with my troubles.
Anyway, the problem isn't so much knowing what I like and wanting to make dreams about doing something I like a reality so much as it is not knowing where to realistically start thinking about what I'm actually going to do (Career availability, expected salaries, and approval by my mother are crucial factors making this far more complicated than just choosing something I want to do and doing it.), where I'm going to go (Which school will actually offer me what I want... which is currently unknown? How am I going to pay for any of this and, subsequently, should I go for the best school possible or something cheaper? Should I care if the place I want to go to is far away from my current home?
Do I even need to visit schools when I personally feel it may be a waste of time unless I know I really want to go there?), and how am I going to choose and make sure I don't end up permanently gluing myself to a path I'll regret? If I could afford to just blurt out what I would dream of getting paid to do despite a lack of knowledge in said field, despite uncertainty about how it would work out (such as actually finding a job or making decent-enough money), and despite my mother's lack of approval, I could say I love video games enough to want to do something involving marketing or developing them or perhaps I could say I wanted something to do with graphical rendering or just something with computers/computer science. If I could afford to choose something that I know quite a bit about and love, but still have the problems of uncertainty, salary, and possible lack of approval, I would say I wanted something to do with biology or historical research.
However, money's an important part and a crucial part of my mom's approval of whatever I do. I'm not quite sure how much my mom's approval really means as I don't even know if she's going to help pay for much or what's going on, but she wants me to do the typical thing a parent seems to encourage... being a doctor or a lawyer. I would think she would then assist me, financially, but we've really never discussed any of this, much, beyond the $10,000 college fund I know exists, for me. After my week-long trip to Boston starting tomorrow (Mom's got a medical conference to attend and I get a free vacation to a fancy waterfront hotel. I'm going because I'm the babysitter for my younger brothers while my mom's at her morning conferences.), I've decided to check out two local schools (even though I'm not particularly interested) just to start somewhere while my mom has agreed to take me along to work, for a day, to get a first-hand experience of the medical profession while a friend has agreed to take me along with her to her law firm for a day.
I still don't think it will help much. I've got to compare what I want to actually do to what makes money and gets my mom's approval. I really don't know how to get out of this rut and wish what I would like to do corresponds with whatever makes money, but I swear that it honestly seems as though the universe has made the two groups mutually exclusive. My mom didn't choose to be a doctor or where she went to school. She just took a baccalaureate, got a huge scholarship to a medical university while her late uncle paid off the rest, and became a doctor while wanting to really be a writer... or at least that's how she told it to me. I can't tell if she dislikes her career or not, but she is tired, quite a bit (I keep trying to convince her to take some time off. :shrug:), and is quite upset over a new contract (though that's not really related specifically to her career path).
Anyway, I just have no clue what to do or how to definitely say "This is what I'm going to do and I won't have any regrets" and I can't go to whatever school I'm going to with an undeclared major and it's because one of my greatest fears are that I'm going to wake up ten years from now thinking that I hate my life and I just needed to tell someone, but while my mom thinks I don't care and haven't been focusing enough on this topic, I've really been sitting here and worrying about it only to get frustrated when I can't think of a right way out of this mess. It's been bugging me and I've been meditating on it a lot :confused:
Anyway, your main problem is not knowing which career path to take? Take a piece of paper and write down some things that interest you or could potentially interest you. Also write down some things your mum has mentioned. Then do some research into these career fields, whether they offer a broad range of jobs or whether they set you on a narrow route etc. For example, you like video games, are you also interested in design? From there - video game design, graphic design, communication design, web design. Or the programming side of things, maybe if you studied programming (or whatever courses there are) you would have the chance to work on video games, but also for other computer based companies (so you have something to fall back on if number one doesn't work out). Also it's a good idea to check out those schools and firms you mentioned even though they don't sound interesting, you might find out something new, and it won't harm to go along.
