1. How is this talk relevant to you?
2. Do you think hard work is more important than
“being smart” when considering the possibility for excellence?
3. Is pursuing a degree in arts and social sciences
better/worse than a STEM degree? Why or
why not?
4. Do you disagree with any of his points?
5. Do you agree with Aristotle’s quote at the end
of the presentation? Is excellence ever
an accident? Is it always choice and not
chance? Why or why not?
6. For those of you considering a degree in math
and science, why are you doing it? Do
you have a passion for the subject? Are
you naturally talented in the subject? Is it a monetary motive? Is one motivation “better” than another? Why or why not?
Marissa Smith
ReplyDelete1. This talk is relevant to me because i am interested in majoring in a STEM area. It was inspiring to know that there are people dedicated to seeing students not only get through these classes and graduate with their degree but to help them excel. I thought it was great to know that there is help out there and I do not have to be another statistic.
2. I think that hard work is more important than smarts because intelligence can only get you part of the way. Intelligence will get you through grade school allowing you to use prior knowledge to make educated guesses. This all changes when you get to college. These classes will require intense studying and work to be the best. This also carries on into 'real life'. If you want a promotion at your job or you want to eventually get to the top of the totem pole in a company, you have to put in the work. Being 'smart' won't cut it. I think the position would mean more to you if you have to invest a lot of time and energy into it and it isn't just handed to you because you're smart. This also relates to grades. Grades do not necessarily reflect intelligence, rather they indicate how much time someone is willing to put into their work. Someone who is not necessary the cream of the crop in intelligence can still be successful, they just have to work a little harder than others.
3. I do not think pursuing either one is better than the others. I think you should pick your major/career according to your strengths and passions not based on monetary motives. If someone is extremely passionate about the arts or social science they should go for that degree. They might not end up 'successful' in the traditional sense but as long as they are happy in what they are doing, that is success in my book. I would rather be at a job i love but only make enough money to get by than have a job where i make a lot but hate to go everyday. But at the same time, I think that STEM degrees might have more stability because it would be easier the find a job as opposed to being a struggling artist, waiting for that big break.
4. I did not disagree with any of his points. I think that students sometimes need the push and the help to be successful in their majors, especially for STEM areas. But i think that he could be a little clearer on how to accomplish these goals of his. He outlined problems, I would have liked him to outline possible solutions as well.
5. I do not agree with the quote because i don't think that excellence is always planned out. Take Mark Zuckerberg for example. Zuckerberg created Facebook for the sole purpose of college students being able to communicate with each other. He never thought that everyone and their mother would be on the site all the time. So many people use Facebook everyday of their lives and it was not created for this kind of activity. That is unplanned success. At the same time, i think that some people know what they want out of life and are determined to get what they want. They make goals at an early age and do everything in their power to make sure they achieve these goals. But at the same time, that doesn't ensure success. I think for the most part , excellence is unpredictable.
6. I am pursuing a degree in Biology and medicine because i have a passion for it. I am not exceptionally good at biology, but i put in work to do well. I am very fascinated by the human eye and all the wonders that it holds and i also love children. That was when i decided that i wanted to be a pediatric ophthalmologist. I personally think that talent and passion are better than money as a motivator. I feel that if you are passionate about something, it will make it easier as a class and in your career. You will actually enjoy learning. I think it will force you to care if you are passionate. Monetary motivation is not my favorite but i think as long as someone is still putting in the work, it is up to the individual to decide which motive is best for them.
1. This talk is relevant to me because although I am not sure what I would like to major in, the STEM areas have always been of interest to me, and I can see myself in one of the STEM fields.
ReplyDelete2. Hard work is absolutely more important than just “being smart”. Being smart can only get you so far in life. As we are now, we value intelligence more than hard work because we have been taught to do so. Only the smartest kids get into the good schools is what we like to think, and because of this we tend to train our brains more than anything else; but, that intelligence can only get you so far out of school. Sure, you can think of ways around hard work with intelligence, but not all of the time. In order to be successful, hard work is inevitable. This is not to say that intelligence is unimportant; rather, that hard work will get you farther in life than intelligence alone.
3. Each kind of degree has its own rewards. There is not necessarily a “better” or “worse” kind of degree to pursue – it depends on the individual’s outlook, and what they want in life. The arts and social sciences encourage creativity and facilitate communication, while the STEM fields advance our knowledge of the sciences and allow us to better understand the world around us. I appreciate both fields equally because I recognize the importance of the social sciences and arts in the same way I recognize the importance of the STEM fields.
4. I do not disagree with his points, but I disagree with the way he presented them. He jumped back and forth between prioritizing just minority groups and all students, and placed a heavy amount of emphasis on his own students, having the audience applaud his graduates. He also only offered a vague solution to the problem of inspiring students.
5. At the end of the presentation, Hrabowski quotes Aristotle by saying that, “Choice, not chance, determines your destiny”, and I disagree. I understand that in this quote Aristotle meant that we each have the power to influence the way our lives turn out, and to some degree we do, but there are too many external variables to say for a fact that we alone determine our destiny. For example, people work their way up the ladder, gaining promotion after promotion, but then get laid off. It is not as if they did not put forth the effort to be at their position, but external factors made it necessary to lay some people off, and some people are luckier than others.
6. As someone who does not know what they want to major in, but has an affinity for the STEM fields, my motives, if any, for pursuing a degree in math or the sciences is based on passion. That being said, passion is probably the best motivator simply because with passion, you want to pursue. You may be great at mathematics, and know the monetary gains of pursuing a mathematic field, but if you do not want to pursue mathematics, then eventually, you would grow from neutrality to hatred for the field. The same goes for any of the other STEM fields.
1. This talk is relevant to me because I’m interested in pursuing a major and career in a STEM field.
ReplyDelete2. I think that hard work is more important than just “being smart” because someone can be intelligent, but also be lazy, so their knowledge cannot be applied to a problem or situation. On the other hand, someone can be a hard worker, but may not be the most intelligent. But because of the effort of the hard worker, the hard worker will gain intelligence through their interaction with the problem or situation. If I were an employer, I would choose the hard worker over the lazy intellect because with the hard worker, more goals would be accomplished.
3. Pursuing a degree in arts and social sciences is not any better or worse than pursuing a STEM degree. Yes, scientists and mathematicians are vital to the maintenance and advancement of society, but the world requires a variety of people who have a variety of skills. For instance, artists are needed to document events and to create powerful graphical presentations that can incite people and encourage them to support a cause (like Ai Wei Wei’s sunflower seeds or backpack exhibitions). Social sciences are also just as important because they can uncover causes and patterns of the actions of humans in a way that the quantifying math and science fields cannot.
4. I do not disagree with any of his points, but I agree with Kristen in that he should have kept the focus only one group of students at a time before shifting his talk to a different group of students. I also had problems with how he presented solutions (increase expectations, build a sense of community, etc.), but he did not say how he was going to implement these solutions. He seemed to avoid this in his presentation and instead provided examples of a few of his students that were successful without really saying how they were successful.
5. I don’t think excellence is ever an accident. Excellence is a product of hard work and careful decisions. For example, if someone has a goal of obtaining a high school diploma, the only way that goal is going to be reached is if that someone puts in the hard work of maintaining their GPA and if they choose studying for their finals over hanging out with their friends. There is not some “predestinated few” who graduate high school by chance.
6. I’m not exactly sure what I want to major in, but right now I’m interested in a STEM major and career because I’m passionate about it. Sure, some STEM fields pay a lot of money and this possible financial stability is comforting, but I feel as though that my interest and passion in the STEM areas trump the monetary motives. I would not go so far to say that I am “naturally talented” in the STEM areas, but when comparing these areas to the English or History classes that I am not as interested in, there seems to be a correlation between my interest and how much information I actually learn and remember for an extended period of time. I don’t think one motivation is “better” than another. As long as the results of the motivation create an ethical, hard-working individual, it should not matter what the individual’s motivation is.
This talk was somewhat relevant to me. I am interested in STEM fields and I like Hrabowski’s message that you can start from anywhere and still go big.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the idea that hard work is more important than being smart. This goes back to the idea that you can lead a horse to water but you cannot force it to drink. In other words, someone can have all the intelligence in the world on one subject or multiple subject, but they can still be lazy. Hrabowski brought up a similar argument when he talked about kids wanting to learn. Hard work comes in when it comes to determination for achieving the highest level of excellence. Also, about being smart, there is no perfectly smart human being. The smarter you are, the more you tend to doubt yourself or trust yourself too much, even when your ideas are horribly wrong. When we gain intellectual power we tend to be arrogant or scrutinize every little thing in search of the truth, even looking for holes in our own arguments. With hard work, you will not be lazy and you will take your time to make your work near perfection.
I think that no college degree is bad, whatsoever. It is the intent behind getting that degree that would make it look bad or good. For instance, If you get a degree in arts or science, graduate college, and love getting up for work everyday because you truly have a passion for your specialty, then you chose a good degree. On the other hand, if you got an arts or sciences degree because your parents forced you to, you wanted to buy that fancy mansion, or you wanted to get a degree that would involve little studying, then I would imagine you’d be some tortured soul stuck in a cubicle farm until retirement.
If there was one flaw in Hrabowski’s speech, he sounded a little arrogant and ignorant of the things around him. He sounded as though he endured the worst obstacles in the world to get to where he is today. He was bragging to the audience, saying how he got thrown in the slammer at age 12 in Civil Rights era Alabama and their struggles are worthless. I respect him and all the Civil Rights activists’ struggles to change America into what we see today, but there are other people who went through things worse than getting locked up at age 12. People escaped genocide, poverty, and war from other countries and came to America to start a new life, and were successful. The American colonists escaped England’s tyrannical monarchy to start a new life in America; of course, through hard work. They even fought disease, Native Americans, and their mother country to keep hope alive.
I do not think excellence ever accidentally happens. Excellence only comes with hard work in the real world. For example, Wernher von Braun, German pioneer rocket scientist, was not born gifted. His academic career was characterized by struggles in classes such as mathematics and physics. He needed an inspiration to improve, and later become known as a world famous rocket scientist. With that being said, we can achieve excellence not by accident, but through perpetual hard work.
As a guy joining the U.S Army, I know what I want to do, but I do not know what to do within my days in the Army. However, I am very pleased with the STEM applications of serving in the armed forces. I hope to gain from my experience in the U.S Army knowledge in tank mechanics and artillery shell manufacturing. Machine components always interested me since I was a small 6th grader. A teacher inspired me with his machine dissection assignments and introducing Leonardo Da Vinci’s inventions to me. It was from this man that I realized that in some way, I am an innovator. This trait makes me feel as though I belong in the Army since military service forces you to push yourself to your limits, mentally and physically. Besides exploring further this habit that has stemmed from my childhood, the one thing that heavily drives to join the U.S Army is serving my my country and being known as a hero, not “OG.”
1. This relates to me because I want to major in a STEM area, but also because Freeman points out what students are afraid to point out: they do not want to sit in a classroom and hear someone talk the whole entire period, they need to be engaged. To me, that is essential because that is the main problem with teaching these days – much of the time I am bored because the teacher just lectures the whole class. More classes need to have student engagement in order for the student to learn the items at hand.
ReplyDelete2. Yes, hard work is more important than being smart when considering the possibility for excellence. In our education system, this is the complete opposite because one can try really hard and make an OK grade while someone smart can do no work at all and they end up with a higher grade. In real life (post-education), hard work can you a long way. Hard work is needed in order to move up the economic hierarchy. For example, if you are an employee, you can become an assistant manager through hard work and dedication, and maybe even a manager if something were to have happened to make that position available and you really worked hard. This is true in all other occupations; hard work and dedication can help one excel in any area.
3. I don’t think that it matters what area of occupation you pursue, as long as you are passionate in what you do then you can live a fulfilling life. There are some pros and cons between these areas of course – the main one being monetary. STEM degrees offer a more stable income while those in the arts and social sciences have fluctuating incomes. For example, scientists and engineers are high in demand and so it would be easier but more competitive to find a job, while artists have to make their job grow by making themselves known in order to sell their art, which may take a while with periods of low income. But, money should not be one of main factors in career choice – you may feel happy with all that money, but you won’t live a fulfilling life as money can only get you temporary, materialistic happiness.
4. No, I do not disagree with any of his points because I do think that for students to excel, they need to have high expectations, a community of learning, people who work in the area that they are interested in as teachers for hands-on experience, and also faculty members that are willing to get involved with students.
5. Freeman quotes Aristotle at the end of the TED talk by saying that “Choice, not chance, determines your destiny.” I do not agree with this quote because we do have a say in how our lives turn out, but there are still many other factors that influence our lives, and most of the time we cannot choose them. For example, when applying to Stanton, you chose to go to that school but if you apply for the honors program, then it is by chance that you are chosen to get in. Therefore, sometimes it is based on chance that determines your destiny, or in this case what high school you go to.
6. I am still undecided in my future, but I am interested in pursuing a degree in one of the STEM fields. I do have a passion for science and math, and among other things they also come easy to me, especially math. I think money plays a strong factor in pursuing a degree, but it should not be the only factor that one should consider. You also have to consider whether it is a fulfilling job so that you don’t feel empty, in a sense. I don’t think that one motivation can be necessarily better than another, just as long as they help to develop a person with a good work ethic.
1. This talk was relevant to me because I hope to pursue a future career in a STEM field.
ReplyDelete2. I believe that hard work is definitely more important than just being smart. Hard work is favored more when it comes to effort rather than just being smart and putting in the hard work shows dedication and a lot of care towards the action. Just having knowledge and being intelligent can't get you very far besides doing well in school. Once someone enters the real world, they just can't use their intelligence to get through real life situations. Someone can just be smart and not know common sense because just knowing information isn't that beneficial when it comes to showing effort. But of course, being smart is always favored through education because throughout school, people mainly focus on the grades and not how someone got the grade. For example, a student could not study for a test and is just able to retain knowledge and can ace the test. On the other hand, this very hard working student could try their hardest and not get a decent grade on the test. The people out in the world that try hard enough have the potential to succeed just as much as the smart person, but have a reason behind their accomplishments.
3.I believe that pursuing a degree in the arts or the social sciences is just as equal as pursuing a degree in the STEM area. The point of going into this certain degree when we're older is about how passionate we are towards this certain area we want to have a career in. As long as the person is happy and content with that they're doing as their life job, then there's no level of which area of degrees are higher than the other. The only difference there is between these degrees is that the STEM areas have more of a stable job. Someone will always need someone in the STEM area such as a doctor or a engineer. Pursuing a job in the arts or social sciences that is stable is hard to maintain, but as long as anyone puts their mind and heart into it, they can achieve whatever they want to. As long as a person enjoys their degree, that's all that matters.
4. I don't really disagree with any of Hrabrowsky's points, but he was very opinionated and didn't have a solid solution to his problem. I agree with most of his points, especially when he said that in order for students to excel, they need to be engaged during school.
5. I believe that excellence is never an accident. If someone wants to strive to be great, then they will do it by choice. They will take the time and effort into their studies or whatever they're pursuing and try to be one of the best that there is. Being excellent can never happen by chance unless there is a "happy accident" such as someone accidentally doing something, but it turned out to be a success.
6. I've always been interested in the STEM area especially math and science. Since my parents have jobs in the STEM career, they inspired me to do the same and I don't really see myself pursuing an art or social science field. I do have a passion with this subject because I've always liked working with numbers ever since elementary school versus the language arts or history subjects. There is somewhat of a monetary motive just because people think about the future and if this particular job can help them and keep a stable income. There could be multiple motivations coming from different perspectives, but as long as someone enjoys their job or career and feels accomplished then their lifetime then they can say that they made the right choice when it came to picking a degree. I don't think that one motivation is better than the other because certain motivations can lead to beneficial outcomes.
ReplyDeleteBELMIN CIVIC
1. This Ted Talk is relevant to me because I am considering entering a STEM field as a possible career choice for the future. Since people make “straight cash” in that field of labor.
2. I think an amalgamation of two is necessary to achieve “excellence”. Though I do think it favors toward the hard work side because of the way the education system is set up. With standardized tests and the entire grading system, time consuming tasks teachers employ on students require more hard work than actual intelligence. Thus “excellence” is achieved by mainly hard work but you can are being smart does play a role.
3. I think that both fields play an important roles and that they frequently interact with each other, though in a technical sense a STEM field does benefit a country more with advancing it economically. Which in terms of face value is more important that a degree in arts.
4. No I do not disagree with anything he said.
5. Excellence is never an accident. You don’t come to school one day and find excellence on the table; everything is earned through hard work. Essentially excellence would not exist without hard work, because then we wouldn’t know how to measure it.
6. Personally I want to pursue a STEM degree because of extrinsic motivation. Today the majority of American populace is driven by materialistic desires, including myself, and with a high paying STEM career I can buy all the Bugatti’s I want. Though it doesn’t really matter what the motivation is because the end result for better or worse will lead the human race into a new age, as we advance further within the STEM fields.
1. This talk is relevant to me because I might possibly be interested in the STEM field. Maybe.
ReplyDelete2. I think that it is necessary to be both hardworking and smart in order to achieve excellence. It is not enough to just be smart, you have to work hard in order to apply your knowledge and push yourself further. Being smart and working hard are codependent on each other.
3. A degree is the arts or social sciences is not anymore or any less better than a degree in the STEM field. There is a practical use for both fields, with the arts having cultural significance and the STEM field having more of a technical significance. I think what matters more is the passion that goes behind the degree, because someone who is passionate can excel in any field they choose.
4. No. I think that his message was correct.
5. I agree with Aristotle. Excellence is never an accident, it requires a lot of hard work, passion and dedication. To be truly excellent means to put a lot of time and energy behind a goal. It is a choice to be excellent, because we choose how much hard work we will put behind something.
6. I might be considering the STEM field because I genuinely enjoy science and it is something that I love. The money is an added bonus. I do believe that passion is more important than money though because if you are not passionate about something, then you will not enjoy having to spend the rest of your life doing that job.
1. This talk is relevant to me because I agree that teachers are not excited to teach us and that transfers to the students not being excited to learn. This talk is also relevant to me because I want to go into a STEM career.
ReplyDelete2. I think that hard work is more important because that is what employers look for in an employee. They look for a person who tries to stick to what they are doing and do not give up. If a person tries to do good and is a hard worker and tries to learn as much as they can, then that is all that matters. If a person is smart on top of being a hard worker then that is an added bonus.
3. I do not think that pursuing a degree in STEM or in arts and social sciences is better or worse than each other. Each degree can give different information to a society that helps it to increase its strength and productivity. STEM gives us biology and mathematics and the basics of what we are made up of chemically, but arts and social sciences gives us how we think, the different ways we communicate with one another, and how we individually express ourselves. Each degree is equally as important in our society.
4. I do not disagree with his points. I think that some people do need a push to get them going and to push them to do better in school. I do think that how he presents can make a difference in how his speech worked. I think that he should talk more about how the problems that he presented could be solved.
5. I do not think that excellence is ever an accident. Each of us are created and have individual plans for our lives. I think it would be more choice than chance. God has a plan for each of our lives and if that includes excellence, then that is great for you. Each person does choose what path they take in their lives and whether that is the right or wrong path, that determines whether that is excellence or not. Excellence is in the eye of the beholder because excellence in one person's eyes can be completely different than another persons excellence.
6. I am pursuing a career in sports medicine, which is science. I want to pursue this career because I have a passion for helping people. I have grown up watching people suffer from injuries whether on the athletic field or in everyday life. Watching people suffer makes me feel bad for them and I want to always help people in any way that I can. If there is any way that I can help people, I always strive to find it and do whatever it takes to makes someone's life easier. I went to a middle school that had a focus in medicine. Learning about the different parts and functions of the body always interested me. Money does not really motivate me towards this career choice but just wanting to help people is my motive. I think that people whose motivation is money do not really get the full effect of the career and I think that if just getting the money is the motivation, then they will not necessarily do a good job every time they go to work.
1. It is not relevant to me because I am not a minority and I do not plan on attending his college.
ReplyDelete2. I define “being smart” as the ability to learn and retain knowledge. With this said I think “being smart” is more important because you can work forever but if you cannot retain knowledge there is no point in working.
3. Stem degrees are much more important then arts degrees. STEM degrees are more important because they show that you are qualified to create things that are safe and ready to benefit society.
4. I think most of his points were accurate however the entire presentation felt just a tad biased.
5. Excellence is an accident all the time. A very iconic example of this is the post-it note. The post-it note was a failed attempt to create a new glue. The creators, after failing, repurposed the glue and created the now iconic post-it note.
6. I want a STEM degree for many reasons. Firstly, I want to create things that advance and benefit society. Secondly, STEM degrees lead to HELLA cash. I want to be able to work for 30 years, making bank, and then retire to my lake house for the rest of my life. Lastly, I love math. Math is the only thing keeping my GPA as high as it is. Stem degrees will give me the life I want.
1.I think that it’s relevant to me because I am in a racial minority group and I’m thinking about pursuing a major in a STEM field.
ReplyDelete2.Hard work is so much more important than just being smart. There are a lot of smart people in the world but unless you work hard you can’t succeed in anything. Being smart is defined as having intellect, but until you directly apply your knowledge it means nothing.
3.I don’t think that one is necessarily better than the other one because you can be successful in anything that you do. Better and worse are completely relative terms. My idea of “better” could be completely different than your idea of “better” . It all depends on what you hold as more important. But if you say that one degree is better than the other you are telling one person that they are pursuing a lesser career than the the other person is. We need someone in every field of education in order for society to be successful.
4.I didn’t disagree with any of his points particularly.
5.I do not agree with his quote entirely. The actions that we chose to make impact our success in life but some of the choices that we make change our lives unexpectantly. So there is not a formula to guarantee our success. There will always be things that happen by what seems like chance but they stem from the choices that we make in our lives.
6.I am considering a degree in Enviromental Science because I have a passion for improving the way that we interact with the world around us. The way that things work on a biological level fascinates me. I think having passion is more important than being naturally talented in the subject because you can know everything there is to know about something but if you are not passionate about it you will not try your best.
1. I am going to college some day.
ReplyDelete2. They're equally important because with no hard work you will get no where! and without smarts how do you know to work hard? hah and if youre hard working eventually you will be smart yay
3. No, as long as you are doing what you love than it doesn't matter :) <3
4. Only about how great he thinks his college is.
5. Yeah you gotta take cred for your work. Of course some chance is always involved in excellence but its mostly based on effort and purposeful work.
6. I like history so no. But I do want to be a veterinarian because i love animals!!!!!!!!! But yeah I am good at science i guess...not so much math.
1. How is this talk relevant to you?
ReplyDeleteI am in the education system currently and I am surrounded by students of different races. The STEM fields encompass my favorite subjects and I, of course, plan to get a degree concerning them.
2. Do you think hard work is more important than “being smart” when considering the possibility for excellence?
Most definitely. It is evident when you look at a classroom here at Stanton. Yes, some naturally smart kids are at the top, but the rest of us work our butts off. “Being smart” can only get a person so far. Eventually, even the “smart” kids hit a block and that is when the students who have been working for their As the whole time really shine. I can think of numerous kids that definitely don’t get a subject naturally but have a great grade in the class because they fully earned it.
3. Is pursuing a degree in arts and social sciences better/worse than a STEM degree? Why or why not?
Well, the obvious argument is a STEM degree can be more easily applied to make the world grow and develop, whereas degrees in arts and social sciences don’t necessarily directly correlate. Being both a major visual art student and a math geek, it is hard for me to say art doesn’t matter but there is a great chance of getting good money if one gets a STEM degree. A degree in arts or social sciences doesn’t seem to get as many people where they want to be. This might be because a lot of people can’t pursue a STEM degree and getting an art or social science degree might sound a little more intriguing. I personally find them both intriguing. Like Hrabowski said, people who start off majoring in a STEM field, normally end up doing something else because it gets too hard.
4. Do you disagree with any of his points?
High Expectations. Community. Researchers. Willing Faculty. I agree with his ideas. He thinks kids need to be more engaged. He wants kids to be curious and work together to learn.
5. Do you agree with Aristotle’s quote at the end of the presentation? Is excellence ever an accident? Is it always choice and not chance? Why or why not?
Yes I agree with the quote. I don’t see how excellence could ever be an accident. In order to be excellent in something, you have to try. But choice versus chance on the other hand… I think it can be both. Choice and chance can both impact your destiny. Some people are really lucky, but I can’t say it is all chance because I refuse to believe that I have zero control on my own life. I wouldn’t be at Stanton if I thought that. Why would I work super hard if its up to chance whether I make it into a college, anyways. Therefore some choice is a must for me to keep my sanity. I guess my answer is both—chance and choice.
6. For those of you considering a degree in math and science, why are you doing it? Do you have a passion for the subject? Are you naturally talented in the subject? Is it a monetary motive? Is one motivation “better” than another? Why or why not?
I am doing it because I love math and science. They are my best subjects. I also like money. I have a passion for them but that might be because I have a natural talent for them. The most important thing to consider when deciding on a degree is if you enjoy doing whatever it is. Amounts of money is less important than having a job that one loves. As long as you can pay the basic bills, you don’t need money, just happiness.