Course Crisis (1 Viewer)

[-pari-]

*sigh* so i thought i was decided on my course - looks like i'm up in the air again.

my intial inclinations that i was set on was the business/commerce side
first i was thinking b.com/law
but then preferred b.com followed by MBA [partially because MBA was something i wanted to do before, and with com/law it'd stretch to 7yrs + com/law entry is probably too high for my UAI]

so now i'm not sure about this whole business side.
i dont want to go into accounting/finance - so what else can i get out of the commerce degree? i was thinking of going marketing... it would suit my "creative" side more - but then i've read/heard countless opinions that marketing is all wishywashy and lacks any real substance, with shaky career/job prospects.

i have a slight inclination to the creative side --> design.
more specifically looking at interior design/ set/film design - probably through a bach. of architecture degree
but i'm not a great artist. i do alright :S i dont have a lot of background in visual arts/design....
and from what i've gathered, b.arch is a pretty full on course, with a very heavy load, and i'm not sure if i'm passionate enough to slog through long painful hours.......
not to mention in the actual marketplace - i've heard about how darn competitive it is being a designer. there are already plenty out there, pay prospects arent crash hot, nor are actual job prospects.
business is stereotypically more 'secure' than arts....

SO i'm stuck!

if anyone in either career line (business/design) could gimme some feedback/opinions on how they like the course and where they intend to go with it, what you think of the employment prospects etc, that'd be awesome...

 

[danielvh]

How about doing a Bachelor of Economics? Your sig says that you're doing it in high school. Are you enjoying it?

You could double major in economics and marketing which would allow you to enter any of the business field type jobs or marketing jobs.

 

[Epic_Postings]

just to let you know, the better MBA schools in Australia generally requires you to have at least 1-2 years experience before accepting you.

 

[pyko]

hmm, well are you more interested in the business side? or the design side?

coz i'm not sure about other unis, but for most courses at UNSW we have what we call "General Education" subjects - basically do other subjects which are not related to your course.

so i guess if you're more interested in the business side, you can go with a business degree and choose design-type Gen Eds (eg from COFA)

or if ur more interested in the design side, you can do a design degree and choose business Gen Eds

i'm no expert here, but you can maybe even do a combined commerce/design degree??

pyko

 

[ObjectsInSpace]

It really depends on whereyou actually go to uni because they all offer different courses, even if they're under a different name. However, from reading your post, you've jumped to a few conclusons that really aren't true.

First of all, Business isn't "more secure" than Arts. The stigma associated with Arts probably comes from preivous generations: it's actually very flexible, and if you plan well and choose your subjects carefully, you can really do things with it.

I do Arts/Business, which is the best of both worlds. I did Business/Economics for my first year and hated it because it was too dry and my marks across the board suffered because of it. When I switched the Economics half for Arts and started doing stuff that I really do enjoy (communications), my marks really picked up. Where I was previously getting passes and the occasional credit, I'm now getting distinctions. In terms of job prospects, I'm using the communication side of things to supplement my marketing stuff. While I can go places on the communications alone, if I combine marketing with some of the publishing and editing subjects I'm doing next year, there's a whole host of directions I can go. Think of it this way: it's like a game of cards. Degrees like business and science and teaching and whatever else is on offer are like normal playing cards, but Arts is wild. It can be whatever you want it to be, and if you do it right, it can be very valuable.

I don't want to put you off marketing, but it's really not the creative element you're envisioning. While it certainly allows for a little more creativity than accounting subjects, but a lot of it is theory work. In all the subjects I've done fr marketing, only one had had any creative component, and that was the introduction course which is basically a cover of the year 12 Business Sudies marketing section with some extra stuff attatched. Mind you, I've only done two years' worth so far and the course if probably different at other universities.

I'll let you in on another little secret, something they won't tell you at school: don't play it safe. What I mean is that you shouldn't pick your degree based on where the job opportunities are, because if you do chances are high that you're going to end up doing something you hate. I'm a firm believer that if you do what you love, there's going to be a job at the end of it. I'm not saying you'll walk straight into your dream job, but that you'll find something that is far more satisfying than simply spending eight hours a day for five days a week in a cubicle. Besides, you're going to be paying tens of thousands of dollars (or at least the government will be, but you'll pay them back through HECS), so you'd better bloody well be doing something you enjoy. All courses have a pretty intense workload: while some of my friends do thirty and forty hours a week in class (they do science, and some pretty advanced stuff to boot), others find that many of their assessments fall due around the same time. Me myself, I constantly have assessments due throughout the semester as opposed to final exams as all my subjects are structured that way. Once again, choosing a degree based on the workload is one of the stupidest things you can do (it's even stupider than picking something based on job prospects). If you genuinely enjoy what you do, you'll do the work, and you'll get it in on time every time.

And pyko, combined degrees depend upon the rules of the university in question. They have set courses and usually don't like mixing and matching. Fo example, while I can do Arts/Business or Arts/Science, I can't do a Business/Science because it doesn't exist. There are also rules as to what majors you can do, especially on the Arts side of things, because not everything is available. I'm pretty sure I'm the only person at my university doing marketing and communications, and such an option is no longer availble because no-one else does it (I actually had to get permission from both Arts and Business faculties to do it). You cannot simply choose subjects and expect them to be your majors if they're not in the rulebook.

 

[stazi]

I wrote a guide addressing similar problems to yours: http://community.boredofstudies.org...ed-marketing.html?highlight=what+is+marketing