Becoming an EMA

[leonwingstein]

I am currently a junior in high school, and I am in the process of researching colleges. It's a lengthy and tedious process as many of you know, but I have some questions that hopefully some of the people here can help me with.

First, I would like to become an English professor, in a college somewhere. The problem is, there isn't really a major in "college education". Is anyone else going for the same career? I have been told to go for secondary education and then get my master's, but is this the right way to go about this?

Second, am I getting into this too fast? Should I rethink this? Should I look into a more profitable profession? I feel like I am romanticizing what this future I am planning will be like.

Any help would be much appreciated on these topics, thanks.

[onlyaworkingtitle]

First, if you really, really, really know you want to be an English professor, you should go to a school that a) has decent English and education programs and b) allows a double major. Once you have BAs in each of these, it should be comparably easy to a) get into grad school for one of these topics (at least an MA/MFA is necessary to teach at the university/college level) and b) land a TA gig while you're studying. So: 4 years of college + 2 years (at least) of grad school = 6 years (at least) before you're even basically qualified to be a professor. You'll probably also want to publish something in your field before most universities would consider hiring you.

Second, as a high school junior, you are far too young to commit yourself entirely to a profession. Take a chill pill. You've got plenty of room to change your mind. That "over six year" time span before you can become a professor? You should probably consider that it's more than a third of your life so far, and in focusing yourself on that one career path at such a young age you would be cutting off so much potential. Feel free to change your mind -- when you get to college, you may want to only do one major, and that's fine. Double majoring is a lot of work. Pick one, do it well, and you'll probably still have no problem getting into grad school -- if, four years down the line, that's still what you want to do. If it isn't, no sweat -- they're both very flexible fields that can be applied to a variety of other careers.

Another point you're going to hear a lot is that you shouldn't choose a profession based on how "profitable" it might be. At the end of the day, you're going to be working ~60 hours a week at this job -- it needs to be something you're passionate about, something you can enjoy doing every day without burning out on.

So don't sweat the small stuff, kiddo. This is just the first of a bajillion crossroads, and you can always backtrack if you don't like where you end up.

[leonwingstein]

Thank you very much, this really helps. That's the whole thing, I wasn't sure if this was exactly what I wanted to do. I have been doing a lot of thinking and a lot of second guessing, but this seems what will make me the happiest later in life (or at least it seems so so far) and I don't know what college is really like, as I have not been there yet. That's why I am asking second opinions here.

So thank you very much, this really does help.