[Hermes the Thrice Great]

I'm currently a sophomore chem BS major. So far I've done alright in chemistry so far, in fact, there are some parts that I've actually been interested in. But to understand my situation I need to give a quick backstory:

I'm not a stem person. In highschool my interests was principally history. I also like the supernatural, things like alchemy, tarot cards, aliens, ghosts, goetia. I also like topics such as sociology, psychology and a little bit of politics.

The problem with all of this is that you can't make money. If you want a job, get a job in stem, principally engineering.

My original plan (at my Father's urging, he was one)was to become a chemical engineer. However, I couldn't get into any colleges as a chemical engineer, probably because I hadn't taken calculus yet and my history of math being my weakest subject. I got into a university as a chemist though, so my new plan was to spend time there and then transfer over to to chemical engineering.

Unfortunately, I've taken both calculus 1 and 2, got D's in both (now in calc 3, I think I might get a C this time!) and my gpa now is a 2.0. My uni is very strong for chemical engineering, and requires a 3.2 gpa to transfer. So it looks like I won't be able to be a chemical engineer in this uni. From the look of it, I'm stuck as a chemist. (not necessarily a bad thing though.)

What I'm worried about is that chemistry pays somewhat poorly and job opportunities are limited. If you want a better living, you need to go to grad school, which grad school will be difficult for me to get into with my gpa I have so far, it'll probably be difficult for me to get out.

I need help, I've honestly never been so uncertain about my future. College freshman year was a bit depressing for me, its gotten better with some friends in sophomore year, but it still pains me to worry so much about the future. What should I do?

Its been suggested to be to finish my bachelors in chemistry, then pursue a masters in chemical engineering. I think that might be my best plan yet.

[mikasaur]

Have you spoken to your professors and/or advisors at your school? They want nothing more than for you to succeed, and even if they may seem like you as authoritarian figures, they're there to help you.

Bring up your concerns and they can talk you through your situation. If the problem is that you won't have a high enough GPA they can help you figure out how to study better/more efficiently. If the problem is that your interests don't line up with the major they can potentially help you to change. Or they can at least provide you with a roadmap for your future. You can go into a completely different career/industry from your undergrad major, and your professors will know better than you what that looks like. And they know you better than we do!

Good luck. I know how tough it can be to have a bit of an existential crisis. I myself think I may have chosen the "wrong" major and career path. Consider yourself lucky that you're thinking of this stuff now and can take action while taking action is easy!

[jjwinkle]

What I'm worried about is that chemistry pays somewhat poorly and job opportunities are limited.

This subject was prolifically addressed in the "Chemistry: terrible profession that ruined my life" thread at http://www.chemicalforums.com/index.php?topic=49150.0 (as you may know). There was a wide range in the level of agreement with the original poster.

I had a 30-year career as a BA chemist. I always was able to find full-time (if not fabulously paid) work (in analytical laboratories), but I have come to believe that the market for chemists has been declining. http://chemjobber.blogspot.com/2012/04/bls-historical-estimates-of-job-growth.html shows the people employed as chemists declined from 96,000 to 82,200 during 1998-2010.

[url][http://ncsesdata.nsf.gov/recentgrads/2010/html/RCG2010_DST1_1.html/url](National Science Foundation, National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics, which is based on a survey) shows the numbers of unemployed (etc) in 2010 of bachelor's degree recipients in the US in the 2008 and 2009 academic years for various (liberally defined) STEM majors. Unemployment for graduates in engineering taken as a whole was in the range 6.4 - 8.8%, and for chemistry graduates it was 4 - 6.7%. It was about 9% for those in sociology and psychology. Only a decided minority of sociology and psychology graduates were 1 - 2 years later working at a STEM job. A large minority of chemistry graduates were not working in STEM.

(To see where other people in the PAST specifically got to with just a bachelor's degree in chemistry (and other relevant details) look at http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Degree=Bachelor_of_Science_(BS_/_BSc),_Chemistry/Salary. To see where people got to starting with a bachelor's in chemistry (and possibly adding degree(s) to it), go to the Students Review dot com site, adding "/contact_center.php3?searchpid=9" after "com".)

If you always want to be sure of a job in chemistry, I advise you to get substantial experience (at least a few months) operating a GC/MS (gas chromatograph / mass spectrometer). HPLC experience is almost as good.

Your math grades would have to change dramatically for a master's in chemical engineering to be likely.

[jjwinkle]

There may be a real strategic point to your getting a degree in chemistry. One learns a lot of analytical thinking, especially through the math involved, which in an important respect puts one at an advantage in competing against non-STEM or not-so-STEM (nS/nsS) graduates for non-STEM or marginally STEM jobs and in doing well at them compared to nS/nsS graduates. To really outshine the nS/nsS people in such a context, though, you need some knowledge (through electives at the least) in fields such as psychology and sociology.

(As shown at http://ncsesdata.nsf.gov/recentgrads/2010/html/RCG2010_DST1_1.html, a huge number of chemistry graduates have gone on to work at non-STEM or marginally STEM jobs, and http://www.census.gov/dataviz/visualizations/stem/stem-html/ pictorially shows the same for physical science graduates - Put your cursor on "Physical sciences".)

There is also a point to changing your major to psychology, sociology or the like, and since you are just a sophomore, it's probably still easy to do. The advantages of that: 1) you will enjoy your education more, and 2) your GPA will go up (a big deal for getting into a graduate or professional degree program, at least a brick-and-mortar one). Of course, the problem with that is having to run against your parents' expectation. However, that may be a good personal development exercise, as many of us have to learn to challenge parents or others we've been cultivated not to challenge, in order to be ultimately happy.

There are a vast number of people employed in non-STEM professions (http://www.bls.gov/emp/ep_table_102.htm):

Operations specialties managers  1.6 million
Business and financial operations occupations  7.2 million
Community and social service occupations  2.4 million
Legal occupations  1.2 million
Preschool, primary, secondary, and special education school teachers
  4.1 million
Arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media occupations 2.6 million
Sales representatives, wholesale and manufacturing  1.9 million
Office and administrative support occupations  22.5 million

Every one of these has higher growth predicted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics for 2012 through 2022 (ranging from 6.8%-17%) than either Chemistry (5.6%) or Chemical Engineering (4.5%). However, for what it's worth, BLS' 2014 "estimates" (http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm#00-0000) show for 2012 to 2014 for every one of these occupational areas no significant change or a modest decline, for Chemists slight decline and for Chemical Engineers no significant change.

[Dan]

There is also a point to changing your major to psychology, sociology or the like, and since you are just a sophomore, it's probably still easy to do. The advantages of that: 1) you will enjoy your education more, and 2) your GPA will go up (a big deal for getting into a graduate or professional degree program, at least a brick-and-mortar one). Of course, the problem with that is having to run against your parents' expectation. However, that may be a good personal development exercise, as many of us have to learn to challenge parents or others we've been cultivated not to challenge, in order to be ultimately happy.

^This. If you're not enjoying chemistry, change. If you are not good at maths, you will probably never be a chemical engineer.