So, you’ve decided to halve your salary?

Time Magazine recently reported that Florida is contemplating offering discounted tuition to students majoring in science while letting tuition for humanities majors rise.

I’m not in favor of tuition increase for anyone, and I think this idea could artificially push up tuition for humanities students and prevent poorer students from being able to attend college in the first place.

I do think that its objective — convincing more students to pick promising majors — merits discussion.

I wince whenever I meet a science major who wants to go to law school instead of medical school or an accounting major who wants to switch to public relations.

Many of us have had a parent or guidance counselor tell us we can be whatever we want, go to whatever college we choose and study whatever makes us happy.

If we grew up in an America that boasted affordable higher education and economic stability, this advice might not sound so naïve.

But given the cost of higher education and the state of the economy, students must treat their education as the massive financial investment it is and ask how they can most realistically make it pay off.

I’m certainly not suggesting that no one should major in English.

It can be a promising path for brilliant wordsmiths. But students must understand the difference between a vocation, a career to which one is suited, and an avocation, a hobby.

For instance, I am fascinated by aviation, but I am heading to law school this fall because my conviction that I can be a talented and dedicated lawyer is as strong as my conviction that if my abysmal math skills didn’t put the brakes on my aerospace engineering career, my responsibility for the fiery deaths of hundreds of travelers certainly would. So, I’ll be content to build model planes when I’m not buried in legal code.

Students who enjoy keeping up with current events and reading Shakespeare but who also have the math skills required for a science, engineering or business degree should take note of this:

According to Time, the best-paid majors are in engineering, computer science and healthcare, while the lowest paid are in the arts and humanities.

It’s obvious where the money lies. And to paraphrase John Cheese of Cracked.com, money can’t buy happiness, but lack of money can prevent you from being happy.
I believe Florida’s proposal is imperfect, and I believe colleges seeking to usher more students into the sciences should consider allocating more scholarship funds toward those fields instead.

Twenty-year-olds are notoriously bad at thinking long-term. But financial incentives are powerful stimuli and encouraging students to pursue careers that tangibly benefit humanity by creating new products and improving quality of life while paying dividends on their college investment is a worthwhile endeavor.


­— danoconn@indiana.edu