I had soaked up all that chemistry, physics, biology, and even had survived calculus, when I realised I was terribly burnt out on science. Then my animal biology lab teacher chloroformed a white rat we'd been playing with all semester in front of me and dissected it.
The next semester, I switched to history and sociology. I'm not saying history was easier--it's more than memorising dates, you know, but it was less intense, less full of ups and downs. And I found it much more interesting than I did the practice of science, which when you get down to it can be tedious, repetitive, and really, with the burn out I'd lost the spark I'd had for it. Instead, I threw myself into studying people--their history, their languages, art, etc. I went on to get a degree in history, sociology, and honours (a Great Books programme), went back and added a classical civilisation major and a Judaic studies minor, and then spent years in the ancient and mediaeval history graduate programme. Granted, I'm not working in that, I'm working as a librarian, which benefits from all sorts of backgrounds. :)
I do still love science--much like I love technology--but I prefer to be an armchair scientist, rather than making it my life's work. But I did find this interesting:
Why Science Majors Change Their Minds (It’s Just So Darn Hard)
Studies have found that roughly 40 percent of students planning engineering and science majors end up switching to other subjects or failing to get any degree. That increases to as much as 60 percent when pre-medical students, who typically have the strongest SAT scores and high school science preparation, are included, according to new data from the University of California at Los Angeles. That is twice the combined attrition rate of all other majors.
For educators, the big question is how to keep the momentum being built in the lower grades from dissipating once the students get to college.
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