If you went to college what did you major (Languages & Work) Language Learning Forum

If you went to college what did you major
Tags: Career \| College/University \| Learning Strategy
Language Learning Forum : Languages & Work

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Ulmo
Diglot
Newbie
Joined 6089 days ago
20 posts - 22 votes
Speaks: Portuguese*, English

Message 129 of 169

16 August 2010 at 4:47pm | IP Logged

I'm majoring in Social Sciences, at the Universidade de São Paulo.
1 person has voted this message useful

Iwwersetzerin
Bilingual Heptaglot
Senior Member
Luxembourg
Joined 5672 days ago
259 posts - 513 votes

Speaks: French*, Luxembourgish*, German^C2, English^C2, Spanish^C2, Dutch^C1, Italian^C1
Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin

Message 130 of 169

16 August 2010 at 5:31pm | IP Logged

I have a degree in translation from the University of Geneva, Switzerland (4 years, including one semester as an exchange student in Madrid, Spain) and a postgraduate degree in terminology from the same university. While I studied translation, I discovered that legal translation was what I liked best, so I decided to enroll in law school by distance learning and managed to get a law degree from the University of Paris (Sorbonne) while working as a freelance translator at the same time. Those were pretty tough 3 years, but I don't regret doing it one bit and it was definitely worth it.
Maybe I'll do a PhD in applied linguistics in a couple of years.

3 persons have voted this message useful

SamD
Triglot
Senior Member
United States
Joined 6662 days ago
823 posts - 987 votes

Speaks: English*, Spanish, French
Studies: Portuguese, Norwegian

Message 131 of 169

16 August 2010 at 7:09pm | IP Logged

I got a bachelor's degree in French and a master's degree in English.
1 person has voted this message useful

aarontp
Groupie
United States
Joined 5270 days ago
94 posts - 139 votes

Message 132 of 169

16 August 2010 at 8:43pm | IP Logged

OneEye wrote:

If you're working at McDonald's with a bachelor's degree, there's something wrong. I
have a Bachelor of Music degree (not even a "traditional" degree like a BA or
BS) and I was working as a manager for a major retailer and making pretty good money
doing fun work (fun for a while anyway) at a job where I wore flip flops every day and
talked to cute girls for most of the time I was there. It isn't a job you'd want to do
for life but it was fun for a couple years while I figured out what I really wanted to
do with my life.

I don't think many college graduates are working at McDonald's specifically; but many
are working in low-skill jobs with similar levels of compensation. Maybe that has as
much to do networking-ability, self-confidence, family-assistance, location,
attractiveness, focus, diligence, and luck, as it does with choice of major; but there
are many people in that position right now. The bigger issue isn't even the pay; but
that college graduates are wasting years in positions where they acquire few skills,
and make few or no professional contacts.

Edited by aarontp on 16 August 2010 at 8:46pm
1 person has voted this message useful

maydayayday
Pentaglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 5222 days ago
564 posts - 839 votes

Speaks: English*, German, Italian, Spanish^B2, French^B2
Studies: Arabic (Egyptian), Russian, Swedish, Turkish, Polish, Persian, Vietnamese
Studies: Urdu

Message 133 of 169

24 August 2010 at 12:00am | IP Logged

Traditional degree: Animal physiology and Biochemistry in London, I picked London because it had the highest proportion of foreign students/visitors. Learned a bit of German and Italian in my non study hours.

I had been advised for the four years before to specialise in languages but in your teens you already know better don't you?

First job: trainee linguist for the government. Lousy pay but great opportunities.

Then a Masters in Maths
Bachelor in Education
An MBA
Writing a Ph.D in Computer Science - emphasis on machine translation, eventually.

My interest in language has often been an asset in acquiring a new position but never the only factor.

1 person has voted this message useful

cathrynm
Senior Member
United States
junglevision.co
Joined 6128 days ago
910 posts - 1232 votes

Speaks: English*
Studies: Japanese, Finnish

Message 134 of 169

24 August 2010 at 6:51pm | IP Logged

My degree is in Electrical Engineering. Studying language is completely out of my comfort zone -- so maybe that's why it's new and interesting to me. Language study has not benefited me with my career in any way -- so far.
1 person has voted this message useful

GauchoBoaCepa
Triglot
Senior Member
Brazil
Joined 5422 days ago
172 posts - 199 votes

Speaks: Portuguese*, English, Spanish

Message 135 of 169

24 August 2010 at 7:49pm | IP Logged

I majored in Geography seven years ago.

I'm planning on getting back to university to take up Spanish teaching...linguistics

Edited by GauchoBoaCepa on 24 August 2010 at 7:50pm
1 person has voted this message useful

sebngwa3
Diglot
Senior Member
United States
Joined 6167 days ago
200 posts - 217 votes

Speaks: Korean*, English

Message 136 of 169

20 November 2010 at 8:31pm | IP Logged

newyorkeric wrote:

Data on faculty salaries are available so we can at least remove that aspect from the
debate. According to the Chronicle of Higher Education (a well-respected paper if you don't know it), the
average salaries for faculty in 4 year colleges and 4 year universities in "Foreign languages, literatures and
linguistics" for 2008-09 are as follows:

Instructor $42,080
New Assistant Professor $61,377
Assistant Professor $61,851
Associate Professor $73,510
Professor $92,875

A couple of points to consider when interpreting the data. 4 year colleges and universities will offer the
highest salaries so these numbers are an overestimate of average salaries of all college and university
professors. Also, the salaries of an Associate Professor and Professor seem high, but these are hard
positions to obtain. Many intelligent, hard-working PhD holders will never get there.

I don't think 42k is accurate. It's more like starting salary of 32k plus taking forever to get raised up to
42k.

1 person has voted this message useful

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