What's the Best Major for First Year Students?

Hello everyone, I'm in my junior year and I'm starting to get college brochures and stuff. I know everyone's saying to follow your passion and all, but I want to know: what's a good, all-round major for first-year college students? Just to get settled in and keep my options open.

Responding in a friendly tone, if you aim to keep your freshman year flexible and open to various career paths, I'd suggest choosing something like Liberal Arts and Sciences, or an interdisciplinary major, if your prospective school offers such programs. Why? Interdisciplinary studies usually cover a broad range of subjects including humanities, social sciences, and even some STEM topics providing a solid academic foundation.

Similarly, the Liberal Arts and Sciences major is ideal if you're unsure about what you want to specialize in, because it provides a nice balance of courses across many disciplines. From Critical Thinking to Sociology, Anthropology, or Environmental Studies, you'll be exposed to a wide variety of subjects while developing different skills such as analytical thinking, problem-solving, and communication, which could prove useful in many future career paths.

That being said, if there's already an area that interests you more – let's say biology but you are not yet sure about the specialization – you may choose to major in biology as a 'general' major first. In most colleges, during your first two years, you will generally be taking courses fulfilling general education requirements anyway, which are usually quite broad and cover various fields of studies. Also, remember that your initial choice of a major isn't permanent, most of the students change their major at least once during their college journey.

Ultimately, your first-year major should be something that you find engaging so it can help smooth the transition from high school to college. It would help if you also keep an open mind about exploring new subjects and interests.