Thomas Moreno walked into business education 120 a couple of minutes past 4:30 and into the choosing a major workshop as a college student with an undecided major.
Moreno made the decision to attend because a counselor had suggested he visited the event.
Like other college students finding their way, Moreno was looking to explore his options between two different paths.
The workshop held on Wednesday, Jan. 30 is one of a series of workshops being hosted by the career services division to aid Cerritos College students.
Led by Career Counselor Clara Ross Jones, the workshop had a one-on-one feel, where Jones helped each student take an assessment test to help them determine which major they should follow.
Jones assured the attendees “if you are undecided, you are not alone.”
She continued, “Choosing a major doesn’t equal choosing a career.”
The career counselor informed students that about 100 to 125 majors currently exist at Cerritos College and other community colleges.
“I’m nervous to find out my results,” Moreno told Jones as they both anxiously clicked keys on the computer in order to find out his suggested major.
Moreno was able to get some answers regarding his future career, “I found out I want to be a park naturalist. [It entails] conservation of nature preserves, providing basic information so that [people] don’t harm the eco systems forming there.
“It was a new finding, I was just running around in the wild, now that there’s a job based on that, I totally feel better. I knew it was either engineering or environmental science.”
Jones expressed that career services helps students feel like they are not alone in their quest to find a major.
“We want to give students a venue to be able to explore […] and not feel like ‘who’s going to help me with this?’ cause sometimes we get students in our office [who say] ‘everyone knows and I don’t know and I feel bad because I don’t know’ and they don’t know, I don’t know,” Jones said through laughter.
“I’m moving through just like you are moving through, it is a process. We want them to feel comfortable and supported in that.”
The counselor also expressed how students with an established major may change their mind upon taking classes needed for their major.
“We get people who [come in like] ‘I came in doing business and then I took that first accounting and now I’m rethinking business,’ or ‘I thought I wanted to be a psychology major but I took [psychology] 101 and I don’t know if that’s the way I want to go.’
Jones also explained how some students are truly undecided and don’t have clear definite answers.
“Like the student who was sitting in there, he had a couple things in mind and so he was playing back and forth with a couple of things
“So he just wanted to talk that out a little bit and the assessments kind of gave him a little bit more information on both of those, so he can make an educated decision.”
The counselor was referring to Moreno, who stated that he would be following up with a counselor now that he was provided with answers following his assessment.
“Often times, they’ll follow up, they’ll make an appointment with one of the career counselors, we’ll talk about their assessment and we’ll talk about where they want to move from there and what schools have their program,” Jones stated.
She added, “Now they feel more invested because they feel like they’ve done the process of exploring who they are, and not only who they are but how that connects with the world of work.”
According to Jones, there are six or seven workshops being hosted by career services this semester to help students take the time to think of their career and major choices.
