Eastern University offers a wide range of programs and potential majors. In my time here, I have met students majoring in History, Education, Dance, Philosophy, Psychology, Mathematics and many, many more. Yet, with such a large variety of majors, it begs the question: which is the most popular?
According to Institutional Research, the five most popular undergraduate programs at Eastern are (in order from most to least popular) Business Administration, Psychology, Exercise Science, Pre-Nursing and Criminal Justice. As much as I would love to say that Eastern “is not like the other girls,” the reality is that this is a fairly typical breakdown. In fact, according to the National Center for Education Statistics, about 19% of all bachelor’s degrees awarded in the United States are in the field of business, followed by healthcare programs (13%), social sciences (7%), biological and biomedical sciences (7%) and psychology (6%).
According to a survey run by The Princeton Review, 46% of respondents cited a “potentially better job and higher income” as the primary benefit of a college degree, versus 29% who cited “exposure to new ideas” and 25% who cited “education.” This data helps shed light on why the majors listed above are so popular. Business is a highly adaptable and bankable major, relevant in innumerable fields; healthcare and the sciences offer a high income ceiling. The comparatively less-popular humanities majors (i.e., the fields of history, philosophy, social science, etc.) are generally seen as being less profitable. Now, everyone has their own reasons for choosing a major, but there is no denying that CHC (Cold Hard Cash) plays a substantial role.
As a side note, the most popular graduate programs at EU are Organizational Management, Data Science, Data Analytics, Social Work and the Data Science/MBA Dual Degree. The high enrollment of Data programs is most likely a result of the technological advances of the past decades, what with the prevalence of computer systems and AI.
College is a gamble. Students bet large quantities of money in the hopes of reaping greater rewards, whether they be monetary, spiritual or otherwise. Whether that gamble is worth it is up to a wide variety of factors, one of which is the choice of major, be it one of the more common routes or something more unusual.
