For students at Kennesaw State, pursuing a minor is not worth it. Students are likely to encounter issues with financial aid, choices for minor programs and interference with academic performance in one’s major when pursuing a minor.
The nature of college is for students to take classes and earn a degree, with the end goal of starting a career after graduation. A minor can cause issues with completing this goal.
A well-picked minor can aid in one’s career hunt, but with over 80 minors available at KSU according to the 2019-20 Undergraduate Catalog, the number of choices can lead students to choose poorly.
Poor choices can include a minor that is too similar to an individual’s major or has no relevance to the career one desires after graduation.
Declaring a minor can also cause students to lose job opportunities after graduation by limiting the time a student can put into internships before graduation, or increasing the amount of time a student takes to graduate, according to Time.
If a student wants to declare a minor, they should do so before their senior year when a student should be looking for job opportunities and experiences. According to Time, these professional experiences are more valuable on a resume than a minor would be.
“An internship would be more beneficial [than a minor],” sophomore English major Aaron O’Connor said. “At least with that you can get your foot in the door in your field. Minors just help with figuring out how specialized you wanna go.”
Another issue is the limitation placed on financial aid in relation to how many classes one can take.
At KSU, approximately 50 percent of students borrow a loan to help pay for their college tuition and cost, according to the Office of Financial Aid website. For undergraduate students, financial aid is limited to a maximum time frame — 185 attempted credit hours.
Students must complete their degrees within the 185 attempted credit hours, which includes transferrable credits attempted at any school prior to and while enrolled at KSU, or a total of 150 percent of the hours needed to complete one’s first degree plus 60 additional hours for a second bachelor’s degree, according to the awarding policies on the Office of Financial Aid website.
Because of the high volume of students using financial aid, and with the amount of time students take to graduate increasing to between six and eight years, according to a study by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, the risk of using all of one’s attempted credit hours before graduating by failing classes or extending one’s time in school is not worth it.
Overall, the risks associated with pursuing a minor in college outweigh the benefits, especially when considering that other opportunities like internships and job experiences are more beneficial after graduation.
