Gov. Rick Scott clearly touched a nerve a few weeks ago when he bashed anthropology majors, saying he thought we had too many. The local responses were furious. While I disagree with his implied premise that a liberal arts education is not as valuable as a STEM education, we really do have too many anthropology majors.
First, discussing anthropology is just a metaphor for the larger problem regarding how students select their majors in college. Anthropology is an incredibly important discipline. I have many friends who I am convinced will use what they learned in their anthropology coursework here at UF to change the world for the better. I am not attacking the subject itself, which is how I think many people construed the governor’s comments.
However, we have 634 anthropology majors this fall at UF. There is no way even 10 percent of these students could go to grad school in this discipline and find a living wage coming out. It’s clear from talking with friends that the major can be tough if you apply yourself and do research, but it can also be unbelievably easy if you coast, which is what a good number of people are doing.
I know people who majored in psychology and English who are having a really tough time right now in the job market. This is partly due to the reputation these majors have because of the less serious students who choose them. If you are not sure about what to major in, please don’t major in psychology. There are countless other departments that teach you interesting things that might give you a good GPA if you look hard enough. Geology, physics, geography, chemistry and the foreign languages are all areas that have the capacity for more students. I think there is a herd mentality in college where you want to major in the same discipline as your friends, and this is a detriment to everyone.
I came to UF and majored in political science. While I think it is a valuable major, it was a very large one. I decided to look around more and found the statistics and economics departments, which have been a good fit for me. When there are more than 1,400 psychology majors, there is clearly a problem at UF. I can’t really blame the governor for asking a serious question: Why should the state give funding for students to study a subject when the data suggests they are not as able to get jobs as others?
I think the answer is to encourage people who want to be anthropologists to study anthropology. If you are really good at the subject and find it interesting, that’s a good reason to study the subject, as long as you are willing to participate in internships and extracurricular activities to prepare yourself for the job market.
I don’t have the answers, but perhaps the professors in these overcrowded departments could raise the grading standards. This would discourage all but the most serious students from studying these disciplines. There would be an incentive to shop more heavily for what’s truly interesting to a student.
If you care about finding yourself in college, there are certainly cheaper ways to do it. The state government should not force people to change their majors, but they should absolutely provide incentives for people to study subjects they view as critical to the state. As long as UF receives state money, the state of Florida should have a say in how the institution is educating students.
If you want an easy major and don’t want to work hard, give those students who want to be psychologists or anthropologists a break by not overcrowding their classes. Go to the business college.
Travis Hornsby is a statistics and economics senior at UF. His column appears on Mondays.
