- ‘Intended major’ is the field of study or discipline that you plan to focus on in college.
- Researching majors and choosing an intended major can help you build a strong list of possible colleges to attend.
- Choosing an intended major does not mean you are stuck with your choice once you start college. You can change your major at any time.
There are several factors you need to consider when shortlisting prospective colleges you would like to attend. Some of the main factors include the cost of tuition, the school’s reputation, the campus size and location, facilities on campus, and of course, your intended major. Before discussing how to shortlist colleges based on your intended major, it helps to get a better understanding of what intended major means.
What Does “Intended Major” Mean?
Your intended major is the discipline or field of study that you plan to focus on in college.
All college students have to declare their major at some point. However, not all students know for sure what they want to major in. This is where an intended major comes in. It states that you ‘intend to’ focus on a particular field of study in college but are not yet sure whether this is a final decision. It implies that your decision is not set in stone and you may change your major in the future.
Top Intended Majors
While some students enroll to college undeclared (or undecided), here are some of the most popular intended majors:
- Health professions and related sciences
- Business, management, and marketing
- Liberal arts, sciences and humanities
- Computer and information sciences
- Education
- Engineering
- Biological and biomedical sciences
- Psychology
Importance Of Choosing A Major
Most colleges ask prospective students to list one or multiple intended majors on their applications. They want to get an idea of what you intend to study and which program you’re likely to enroll in at their school. For you, determining your intended major can:
- Help You Create Your College Short List. Not all colleges offer the same majors. So identifying an intended major in high school can you identify (and remove from your list) colleges that don’t have your intended major and add schools your college shortlist that do have your intended major.
- Strengthen Your College Application Essay. Your intended major can help provide a foundation on which you can build your application essay and other components of your college application. You can emphasize why you want to pursue that particular course of study or which life experiences sparked off your interest in that field. Brownie points if you can connect your extracurricular activities to your intended major.
- Guide Your College Course Schedule. When you begin college, your intended major will course you enroll in as you’ll need specific classes to satisfy major requirements.
Remember, you will be able to change your major midway through college but having an intended major helps you get started without getting overwhelmed.
7 Tips For Choosing Your Intended Major
You know what an intended major means and why choosing one is important but the big question is how do you choose one when you are undecided? These tips will help.
- Make a list of your personal interests. If your list includes things like conducting science experiments, researching historical facts, writing, or following national or international politics, these are some of the areas you should focus on. Eliminate things you have absolutely no interest in and focus on areas you love.
- Consider your strengths and weaknesses. Do you consistently do better in some subjects than in others? In general, you’ll be more successful in college (and your career) if you focus on subjects that play to your strengths instead of choosing subjects that you tend to struggle with.
- Take a closer look at your transcript and extracurricular activities. Do you do particularly well in humanities courses and were you actively involved in your school newspaper? If so, intended majors related to creative writing, media, or journalism may be good choices for you. On the other hand, if you’ve participated in Science or Math Olympiads at any levels, you may want to choose an intended major related to a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) field.
- Consider your career goals. Explore career paths you think you may enjoy. You may change your field and pursue a completely different career path after college, but narrowing your career goals now will give you some direction and help you determine what to study in college.
- Speak to your career guidance counselor. After you’ve spent some time introspecting, it’s time to speak to a career guidance counselor. They are more objective will give you solid advice based on real-life experience. And, they can give you some ideas to think about or new fields of study to explore.
- Take college courses in your senior year. This may mean taking on extra work but taking college courses in your senior year of high school can be beneficial later on. They help you validate your strengths and areas of interest while also giving you a head start on your college courses.
- Visit a career center. If you’re still not sure what to choose as your intended major, visiting a career center at your school or a community college may help. These centers offer a variety of resources including specially-designed tests that help undecided students explore various fields of study.
How To Use Your Intended Major in the College Search
A helpful way to find a college that fits your needs is to use an online tool that searches using your major. One perfect example of this is College Raptor’s FREE Majors database. This tool allows you can explore majors and programs for each type of degree, ranked by popularity and number of students.
Once you find your intended major in the list, you can explore the top schools for that particular subject. If the top 10 don’t work for you because of tuition costs, location, campus size, or some other reason, you can change the settings to include more colleges and universities.
After you’ve decided on a few schools that offer the major you’re interested in, it’s time to look further into each program. Do the programs include the courses you need for your intended career? What are the career rates after graduation from each school? What are the opinions of alumni who have received degrees in that major? Do any pros or cons stand out to you?
What’ Next?
Once you’ve explored the pros and cons of each college or university, it’s time to narrow down your schools and decide which you will want to apply to. If it helps, try making a list of the benefits of each college. Apply only to the colleges that have your major, have programs that interest you, and campuses or activities that fit your needs and wants.
You absolutely want to use your intended major when you’re starting your search for a college. You don’t want to apply to a school and discover it doesn’t even have the courses or major you need to succeed and follow your career path.
Start exploring majors now — for FREE — with College Raptor’s majors search tool. Make a profile for yourself so you can save the schools that best fit your needs, wants, and desired future. When you use this tool, you may discover some colleges that you had not even known about.
