Month: December 2020

Are you a high-school student preparing to go to college in 2021? Chances are you’re still debating the huge decision of which major to pursue. Maybe you’ve narrowed down your list to two or three but haven’t finalized anything yet. The global COVID-19 pandemic might’ve added even more uncertainty to your decision, as you and your parents debate what college will actually look like going forward.

We get it—picking a major can be intimidating, especially in a year like 2020! To help out, we’ve put together a few ideas below to guide you through the process, plus a handful of majors and career fields that will be in high demand in the coming years (even in the crazy pandemic world we find ourselves in today). Read on!

Before you begin: 5 questions to ask

Let’s start by asking a few questions. 

1. What do I enjoy doing?

This can be anything from playing basketball and video games to shopping for clothes. List all of it out. Your answers can help you realize where your interests lie.

2. Out of what I enjoy doing, what am I good at?

This is where you have to be honest with yourself, meaning neither too positive (“I’m good at everything!”) or too negative (“I’m not good at anything”). This is about finding where your hobbies and your skills intersect. So if you love playing basketball but don’t do well with it, then “playing basketball” shouldn’t go on your list. Or you may have a good fashion sense, but have no desire to work with clothing, so leave “fashion” off the list.

3. What do others think I’m good at?

You’ll need to talk to your family and friends to answer this question. Allow them to be frank with you. Don’t be defensive or attempt to argue. Just hear them out and take note of what they say. How others perceive our abilities can sometimes give us greater insight into what we’re truly talented at doing.

4. What do I like learning about?

Out of all your schoolwork, what subject feels less like a chore? Maybe they all seem like chores, in which case, ask yourself, “What do I like learning in my free time?” Even if you don’t read books outside of school, every time you watch a movie, go to a basketball game, or take a walk in nature, you’re learning something. So what is it that most interests you?

5. Once you decide on a major to pursue, do you enjoy the classes?

If you take a class or two in a major and you don’t enjoy the subject, you may want to consider a different path. You may be able to count any courses you take in the major you leave behind as extracurricular classes, so the hours can still go toward whatever degree you eventually pursue.

High-growth job fields

So what jobs should you consider for the future? Here are five jobs to think through. Keep in mind that the projected job growth is through 2029. Most of this data comes from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics.

1. Position: Nurse Practitioner

Projected job growth: 52%

Average salary: $115,800

College degree needed? Yes, plus graduate school

Major: Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) 

Graduate school needed? Yes

2. Position: Solar Photovoltaic Installer

Projected job growth: 51%

Average salary: $44,890

College degree needed? No, but you might stand out better if you have a bachelor’s degree or an associates degree from a technical college. According to OwlGuru.com, nearly 56% of folks in this position have only a high-school diploma.

Graduate school needed? No

Major: Solar Energy Technology

3. Position: Statistician

Projected job growth: 35%

Average salary: $92,030

College degree needed? Yes

Major: Bachelor’s degree in Statistics, Mathematics, Economics, or Computer Science

Graduate school needed? Yes

4. Position: Information Security Analyst

Projected job growth: 31%

Average salary: $99,730

College degree needed? Yes

Major: Bachelor’s degree in Cybersecurity or Management Information Systems

Graduate school needed? No

5. Position: Speech-Language Pathologist

Projected job growth: 25%

Average salary: $79,120

College degree needed? Yes

Major: Communication Sciences and Disorders (CSD)

Graduate school needed? Yes

Parting advice: Don’t stress!

In closing, here are two additional points to keep in mind when choosing your major:

1. You don’t have to choose a major right away

Plenty of folks don’t know what they want to do when they first start college. So you can start out by taking some general-education courses that every student needs to take while you consider your options.

2. Your major isn’t a lifelong sentence

If you graduate with a degree and then realize you hate working in that field, you have the freedom to go back to school if you want. But that may not be necessary—many folks don’t have a job related to their degree. And increasingly, people are switching careers entirely. The point is, don’t feel like the rest of your life hinges on the major you choose, because it doesn’t. 

Well, that’s all for now! We hope you’ve been able to find some useful information here, and we wish you the best of luck in choosing your major.

Success comes in many different forms. In North America, we tend to define success in monetary and vocational terms—how much you make or how far you’ve advanced in your career. But success extends to so many other areas: relationships, faith, character, and health, to name a few.

As a distance education student, you want to be successful in life. You know that getting there takes hard work. In this blog post, we’ll explore 10 of the top attributes of successful people. Whatever your future plans include as a high-school graduate, these characteristics will serve you well.

1. Resilience

How do you deal with failure? If you’re anything like me, it can be easy to retreat and sulk. But in my better moments, I view failure as a necessary step toward success. “Most great people have attained their greatest success just one step beyond their greatest failure,” said American author Napoleon Hill. A defining characteristic of successful people is their unrelenting habit of bouncing back after failure.

2. Flexibility

The ability to “pivot” is crucial to success. Pivoting simply means that you have the willpower and foresight to release a path you’d planned to walk in order to pursue something better. It’s a scary thing, but this type of flexibility is a trademark of successful people. Flexibility is particularly essential for young people just starting out—you might think you know the right direction to take, but opportunities and life circumstances will present a different way forward.

3. Self-discipline

Flexibility and adaptability might be important, but so is self-discipline and the courage to stick with something even when it’s incredibly hard. Yes, knowing when to quit (or “pivot”) and when to persevere is the real test. But the fact is that so many of us give up well before we should. “With self-discipline, most anything is possible,” said Teddy Roosevelt.

4. Others focused

The most successful people in life are radical servers. They look to meet the needs of others and excel at doing so. It’s counterintuitive that serving others would bring you success, but it’s true. Some practical takeaways from this? A big one is that as you build your network, make your interactions with others about what you can give, not what you can get.

5. Frequent reader

A personal story: I quit my day job in 2015 to launch a full-time self-employed career. In the months leading up to that pivotal decision, I read through a series of crucial books that gave me the knowledge and confidence to make the jump to start my own business, including The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, The Millionaire Next Door, Your Money or Your Life, and The 4 Hour Workweek. These books gave me the fuel to try something new and expand my horizons. The ultimate lesson? Successful people—think of Bill Gates, Mark Cuban, and Elon Musk—are also habitual readers.

6. Humility

Truly successful people don’t feel the need to boast about their accomplishments. They are secure in themselves and in their abilities. They don’t wear their success on their sleeve. Successful people bring others together to accomplish goals and for the greater good. “With pride comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom,” says Proverbs 11:2.

7. Abundance mindset

An abundance mindset means you believe there are plenty of opportunities and resources in the world for everyone to enjoy. You don’t need to steal success from someone else—when someone else is successful, that doesn’t mean they are taking success from you, and vice versa. An abundance mindset pairs well with resilience, because you realize that failure isn’t final. More opportunities are out there.

8. Calculated risk taking

Playing it safe leads to mediocrity. Most of us with more than a few years under our belt can look back and see that our greatest achievements in life came when we stepped out and took a risk. That being the case, don’t neglect the “calculated” part of this advice. Being a calculated risk taker means that you don’t fly blind—you examine the situation and make the right move, even a bold one, but it’s always grounded in reality, not pie-in-the-sky thinking.

9. Prioritization

We all have a limited amount of resources in our lives, time being the most precious. Figuring out your priorities and sticking with them is a prerequisite for success. Prioritization helps you know when to say yes and when to say no. If you’re anything like me, your to-do list never gets done. That’s why we have to put the highest priority items on the top and focus on those first. Everything lower can wait, or even not get done at all.

10. Love of life-long learning

“Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel,” Socrates said. Education in high school and college is not so much about the knowledge gained‚ as important as that is. It’s more about perfecting the ability to learn—and to continue in that ability for a lifetime.