How to Choose the Right Degree, or – What Should I Major in?

For most of us growing up, the educational system wasn’t a choice. We went to schools in the districts we lived in, and we took the same subjects as anyone else did. 

Everything changes, though, when comes the time to look for the most suitable university. Suddenly, you can choose over 400 majors, faculties, departments, and minors, and the process can feel quite overwhelming – but it doesn’t have to be.

If you prepare properly, and ask yourself the right questions, easily you would be able to strike out most options and only debate between the ones most relevant to you.

First, you must refine our personal characteristics - occupational tendencies, personality structure, and, of course, your needs. The next step would be checking the study and employment options in the fields you are interested in. Eventually, you will look for an adequate connection between the findings of the first two steps.

Several questions will help you in the first two stages (refinement of personal characteristics and study of employment options):

• What did you want to be when you grow up?
• Is there a profession or field of knowledge that you were always interested in?
• Does this profession have an organized course of study?
• What are the conditions for admission to this course and do you meet the criteria?
• What is required of you to meet the criteria you can’t currently meet?
• To what extent is the requested profession able to support you in terms of the profession’s current income levels?

Are you a realist or a humanitarian?

• In high-school, did I like biology, chemistry and computers?
• Or was it geography, literature, language, and Bible studies?
• Since high school, have I found areas of interest that are opposite to those I chose in high school?

Identifying Market-Leading Professions

• Is the job market flooded with graduates in the field?
• Can I major in these professions and what are the requirements?

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Personal Characteristics

• Would I enjoy working in an office?
• Am I the energetic type that thrives in action?
• Do I like standing in front of an audience?
• Or do I prefer being behind the scenes?

Be honest with yourself and don’t hesitate to ask for other people’s opinions. Make sure they know you well and want the best for you and your future.

What are the reasons for my choice?

Do I choose what suits me to study out of a desire to advance myself in my professional life or out of environmental pressure? Here, too, you will have to be honest with yourself and separate between social pressures and your free desires.

Which Educational Framework is Suitable for Me?

Am I interested in a long-term studies such as a university degree, or perhaps a short-term course would be better for me?

The questions proposed to you here are taken from a working-environment adaptation process that perfectly applies to the selection of future studies. Once you’ve answered these questions with complete honesty, all you need to do is choose the educational institution that is right for you.

Don’t be discouraged if the admission conditions do not match your candidate data. Matriculation completion programs, pre-academic preparatory courses, and improving the psychometric test result are all steps you can take to improve your data. These processes may help you better refine what is right for you to study and where you can succeed.

Some find it difficult to accept the recommendations that arise from this model, and you too may encounter a gap between dreams, study options and the market situation. To be successful in your studies and later on in life, you will need to cultivate all your mental strength and find ways to deal with conflicts that arise between your emotions and your rational.

Various types of conflicts may arise here, both internal and external. You may find it challenging to accept external recommendations, or you might find it difficult to follow your own dreams when your family pushes for you to take on the family business.

Either way, resolving your conflicts before beginning your studies is the best advice we can give.

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