Four years ago, computer science looked like the safest bet in higher education. Universities rushed to build new computing centers. Students piled into CS programs. The promise was simple: learn to code, graduate, make six figures.
Then AI arrived.
Now entry-level software jobs are under pressure, and the supposedly future-proof degree looks considerably less future-proof. And that should teach students a lesson that universities, parents, and career counselors have been reluctant to admit:
There is no safe college major.
If artificial intelligence can transform the prospects of computer science in the few years between freshman orientation and graduation, why pretend we can predict which degree will guarantee a job four years from now?
We can’t.
And that uncertainty should be liberating rather than terrifying.
Students should stop treating college as a four-year employment vending machine and start treating it as what it uniquely is: a chance to become educated.
That doesn't mean taking every trendy course with a provocative title. Universities offer plenty of classes whose intellectual ambitions are considerably smaller than their political ones. A course title can sound fascinating and still amount to four months of fashionable jargon.
So investigate. Read the syllabus. Ask students who took the course. Find the professors who are genuinely demanding. Choose classes that force you to read difficult books, argue carefully, write clearly, and confront ideas you haven't already encountered.
And don't confuse “useless” with “worthless.”
Joshua Katz wrote his dissertation on Indo-European personal pronouns. For years, it sounded almost comically obscure. Then pronouns became a cultural and legal flashpoint, and suddenly expertise that seemed useless became surprisingly relevant.
Philosophy offers an even better example. For centuries, students have been told that philosophy is impractical. Now, as AI systems raise questions about reasoning, consciousness, ethics and responsibility, major AI laboratories are hiring philosophers.
The lesson isn't that everyone should major in philosophy.
It is that utility is remarkably difficult to forecast.
Today's hot skill can become tomorrow's commodity. Today's obscure field can become tomorrow's strategic advantage. And an AI system capable of automating yesterday's “high-value” tasks makes confident predictions about tomorrow's labor market look especially foolish.
So don't choose a subject because someone promises it will make you rich.
Choose professors who teach you to think.
Choose books that make you uncomfortable.
Choose disciplines that give you a vocabulary for understanding the world.
Choose something difficult enough that you cannot outsource the intellectual work to a machine.
And if your overriding goal really is employability, there is an increasingly obvious alternative: skip the four-year degree and learn a skilled trade. Electricians, carpenters, plumbers and other hands-on workers are unlikely to be replaced by a chatbot anytime soon.
The real mistake isn't studying something “useless.”
The real mistake is spending four years studying something you don't care about because someone promised it would be useful.
Nobody knows what the economy will reward in 2030.
So stop pretending they do.
Study something worth knowing.