Looking for Advice on Choosing a College Major/Career Path

Hello! I’m 21F, and I recently completed two years at a community college studying Special Education. However, I’ve realized that I don’t think Special Education is the right career path for me, and I’m trying to figure out what direction I should take next.

I’m extremely introverted and tend to do my best work independently. I’m also a very hard worker and have held leadership positions. I know I’m capable of taking on responsibility and staying committed to something I care about.

One of my biggest strengths is writing. I’ve always enjoyed it and have excelled in writing throughout college. I’ve even received recognition for several papers I’ve written. I also have a strong interest in history and genuinely enjoy researching, learning, and writing about historical topics.

On the other hand, I’m not particularly strong in math or science. They do interest me, but I’ve never considered them to be areas where I naturally excel.

At this point, I’m looking for a career that would allow me to use my strengths, preferably involve a good amount of independent work, and provide a decent income and opportunities for growth. I want to choose a major where I can realistically succeed rather than simply picking something because I’m unsure of what else to do.

I’m honestly not sure where to begin. If you were in my position, what majors or career paths would you consider? I’d especially appreciate advice from people who have degrees or careers in writing, history, communications, research, or other fields that might be a good fit for someone with my strengths and personality.

Thank you!

Jobadvisor

This is a great set of strengths to work with — strong writing, self-directed work ethic, leadership experience, and a genuine pull toward history and research. That combination actually maps pretty well onto several career paths that don't require heavy math/science and reward independent, deep-focus work. A few thoughts before the options:

Major: History, English, or Professional/Technical Writing are all reasonable bases. Don't discount History as "impractical" — it's really a research-and-writing degree, and what you build with it (a strong writing portfolio, research skills) matters more than the major title itself for most of the paths below.
Grad school: Some of these paths (archivist, museum work, academic-adjacent research) benefit from or require a master's later. You don't need to decide that now — finish a bachelor's in something you're strong in and keep options open.
Income/growth reality check: Fields tied purely to "history" (museums, archives) tend to be lower-paying and more competitive than writing-adjacent corporate/professional fields. If income and growth matter a lot, lean toward the writing-for-industry paths and treat history as something you can fold in as a specialty or personal interest.If I had to rank these for you specifically: technical writing and grant writing stand out as the best combo of "plays to your exact strengths," "genuinely independent work," and "solid income with room to grow" — neither needs math/science, both reward research and clean writing, and both have real job markets outside of academia. Public history is worth keeping as a possibility if the history pull is strong enough that you'd trade some income/stability for it, but I'd treat it as a "if I still feel this way after trying the others" option rather than the first move.

A practical next step: since you already have two years of college done, look at whether your credits transfer cleanly into an English, Communications, or History bachelor's — that'll shape which of these paths is fastest to reach.

I inherited ＄100k. I want to make it take me as far as possible. Advice?

I inherited ＄100k. I want to make it take me as far as possible.

I currently work only part time as a server at a restaurant, averaging ＄20/h working 25-30hr/wk. I am 22.

Been without a “real” job for 6 months, post college graduation. Job market is brutal. Honestly don’t think people truly understand, unless they’ve also been unemployed in the past maybe 5 years. Anyway, I’ve applied to hundreds of jobs without getting any full time opportunities.

Just so happened to inherit exactly ＄100k from my great grandmothers passing. I want to be as smart with it as possible. Yes, I will invest or save most of it. I have a paid off car and live in an apartment. I need to research what to do and where to invest, but I’d also like some more input so that I can have as many things to consider. This is probably one of the biggest opportunities of my life and I need to be very smart with it.

Jobadvisor

Congratulations on getting this — and it's smart that you're thinking carefully instead of rushing into something. Quick note: I'm not a financial advisor, so take this as general information to think through rather than personalized advice — for something this size, a fee-only (not commission-based) financial advisor or a CPA for an hour or two is a genuinely worthwhile expense.

A few facts that matter for your situation:

Inherited money itself is generally not taxed as income at the federal level (no "inheritance tax" in most states), but any investment gains you earn after you inherit it are taxable going forward.
Since you're job-hunting and income is currently limited, this money can also function as a safety net that removes pressure to take a bad job out of desperation — that's a real value, not just "money sitting idle."
$100k at 22 invested and left alone has an enormous amount of runway before retirement — time is your biggest asset here, more than the amount itself.A reasonable order of operations for most people in your situation: emergency fund → retirement accounts → taxable index investing, with a small, intentional slice set aside if there's something specific (a course, a move, a certification) that would actually improve your job prospects. The instinct to research before acting is the right one — resist any pressure to decide fast, since none of the good options here have a "use it or lose it" deadline except annual retirement contribution limits.

How to stop feeling embarrassed after asking for too big of a raise?

I recently asked for about a 23% raise after being at my company for less than a year.

I asked for that much because I was hired to take over the work of a senior employee who had been the only person doing this specialized role for years and then went on maternity leave. I’ve taken over much of the work she was doing, so I felt my salary should reflect more of that responsibility.

In hindsight, I realize that what I was asking for was basically a promotion, and management clearly didn’t think I had earned that level of progression in such a short time. They offered me a much smaller raise instead. 1.5%.

I understand their reasoning now, but I feel really embarrassed about having asked for so much. I keep thinking they must see me as entitled or as someone who completely overestimated my value, and I genuinely feel ashamed walking past the managers I had the conversation with.

Has anyone done something similar? Did I make a serious professional mistake, or is asking too high and being told no just a normal part of salary negotiation? How do I stop feeling so awkward about it at work?

Jobadvisor

This is a really common experience, and honestly, your reasoning wasn't unreasonable — you were doing the work of a senior role, so asking for pay that reflected that isn't "entitled," it's a fairly standard (if imperfectly timed) negotiation move. Where it landed wasn't what you hoped, but that doesn't mean you made a serious professional misstep.

A few things worth separating out:

The mismatch was about timing/process, not about you overestimating your value. Taking on someone's specialized workload is real, legitimate grounds to ask for more. Management's pushback likely wasn't "you're not worth more," it was more like "that jump, that fast, isn't how we structure comp here" — which is a completely normal answer to get in negotiations, even reasonable ones. People ask for numbers that get countered down all the time; it's how the process is supposed to work.

Managers deal with this constantly, more than it feels like from your side. You're replaying this conversation in your head on a loop; they most likely are not. Comp conversations are routine for them, and an employee asking for more and getting a smaller number is an outcome they've seen many times before, not a memorable red flag about your character.

The actual data point here is small. You asked, they countered, you're presumably still employed and doing the same valued work. That's the whole story from their side. The embarrassment is coming from inside your own narrative about it, not from evidence of how they're treating you differently.

A few things that might help the feeling fade faster:

Notice if you're mind-reading ("they must think I'm entitled") — you don't actually have evidence for that, just the discomfort of having been told no.
If it's eating at you, a brief, low-key follow-up like "Thanks for hearing me out on that — I hear the timing wasn't right, I'd like to revisit it once I've been here longer" can actually reset the narrative in your favor, showing maturity rather than resentment.
Let your actual work in the following weeks be the thing that speaks, rather than trying to manage how the conversation is perceived.

This kind of ask-and-get-countered moment fades from a manager's memory a lot faster than it fades from yours.

What would you recommend my wife to pursue for a degree/career?

I’m 32 years old and I work full time as a registered nurse. My wife has been trying to get into dental hygienist school for the last 5 years with no luck. Her GPA has been perfect at 4.0 with a good entrance exam score and shadowing hours but the school has a low accordance rate due to limited number of chairs and she has been denied twice already.

At this point we are trying to possibly redirect into a different option because she is 34 and we can’t keep waiting a whole year after being denied to reapply again and then wait 2-4 months to hear back if she is accepted or not and then repeat the process.

We are open to other options but at this point we don’t really know what else to pursue. My wife makes $15 an hour and wants to contribute more to the relationship and I understand that but we don’t know how at her age how to do this and what careers or degrees to pursue.

Was hoping someone on this forum may have advice for her.

Jobadvisor

Five years of trying with a 4.0 GPA is genuinely rough, especially when it comes down to seat availability rather than her qualifications. That's a program bottleneck, not a reflection of her — worth keeping in mind as she considers what's next.

Since she was drawn to dental hygiene, she's likely interested in hands-on clinical/patient care work rather than a desk job — so I'd point toward allied health fields with faster, more predictable admission than the notoriously competitive dental hygiene pipeline:A couple of things worth weighing as you two narrow this down:

Dental assisting is the closest to what she's already prepared for (shadowing hours, dental knowledge, likely already comfortable in a dental office setting) and gets her earning more almost immediately — it could even be a stepping stone if she wants to try for hygiene school again down the road with a foot already in the door.
LPN is worth serious consideration given your situation specifically — having a spouse who's already an RN means she's not walking into nursing blind, and it's one of the fastest paths to a real pay jump with a clear next step (RN bridge) if she wants to keep climbing later.
Local community college acceptance rates vary a lot by region, so it's worth her checking actual seat availability for radiologic tech and sonography programs near you before committing — some areas have the same bottleneck problem as dental hygiene, others don't.

If it'd help, I can also look up rough licensing/program requirements or typical program lengths for your specific state.

Every career test I've taken has added options. Has one ever removed any?

Not sure this is the right way to ask it.

I've done four of these now. 16Personalities twice, once in 2021 and once this year, same four letters both times. The O*NET interest profiler. CliftonStrengths through a work thing. And Careerexplorer, which took me over an hour.

None of them were bad. CliftonStrengths was probably the most accurate thing anyone has ever handed me about myself.

But I have a doc open right now with something like 40 job titles in it and I cannot make it shorter. Every one of those tests gave me more things to consider. Not one of them ever told me something wasn't for me. Career explorer gives you a match percentage across 900 careers, which sounds useful until you notice that a 78% and an 81% are the same number when you're actually trying to pick one.

I keep saying I need to research more before I decide anything. I've been saying that since February.

So the question. Has any of these ever ruled something OUT for you? Something closer to stop looking at that. Because I think that's the thing I actually need and I don't know whether it exists or whether I'm just describing a decision I have to make on my own.

Also fully open to it being a me problem, ive read enough of this sub to know that's usually the answer.

Jobadvisor

Honest answer: no, in my experience these tools don't rule things out, and there's a structural reason why. They're all built on similarity matching — comparing your traits/interests/strengths against a career's typical profile and scoring the overlap. That math produces a ranked list, not a cut list. Even the ones that feel diagnostic (CliftonStrengths) are describing you, not evaluating a specific choice against your actual constraints. Nothing in that architecture is designed to say "not this one" — it's designed to say "here's another thing you correlate with." A 78% and an 81% are functionally the same signal, because the tool doesn't know anything about your rent, your risk tolerance, or what you'd actually tolerate doing five days a week.

So — not fully a "you problem." You correctly diagnosed a real gap: you have a tool that's good at expansion and no tool that does elimination. That's worth naming directly instead of doing a fifth version of the same test hoping it behaves differently this time.

What actually does elimination is constraints, not fit-scores. A few ways to force your list down instead of out:

Hard dealbreakers first, not soft preferences. Not "I'd rather not," but "I will not." E.g., if you know you won't do cold outreach sales calls, or won't work weekends, or need to stay under a certain amount of school debt — apply those as hard filters, not as one more data point among forty. Anything that fails a dealbreaker gets deleted, full stop, no "but the match % was high."
Pick the two or three constraints that matter most and rank the list by those alone, ignoring interest-fit entirely for one pass. Income floor, time-to-employment, environment (people-facing vs. solo) — whatever's actually load-bearing for your life right now.
Time-box a "no re-adding" rule. Once something's cut, it's cut for 6 months. The doc keeps growing because nothing you remove stays removed — you're allowed to keep re-litigating it, so you do.

The tests were never going to do this part, because this part requires information about your actual life that a personality inventory doesn't have access to. That's not a test problem or a you problem — it's just a different kind of task than what those instruments are built for.