Was your choice in major influenced by passion or amount of

money that you will expected to make?

Group A4
Kathryn Penunuri, Halie Crook and Caitlin Smith
EDT 180A
Gary Lewallen
4/4/2018
Introduction
The proposed question was, “was your choice in major influenced by passion or amount
of money that you will be expected to make?”. The conclusion to this question was based off of
answers provided in the survey given out. The questions we asked were as followed:
1. What made you decide your major?
2. What are your top 3 priorities pertaining to your future career?
3. On a scale of 1-10, how important is it to you that you are adequately compensated in
your profession?
4. Where do you see yourself financially in 10 years?
5. Which college are you enrolled?
The data was collected through Google forms, and there was 145 responses received.

Discussion

Figure 1: This graph shows how people ranked importance of pay on a scale of 1-10. We see
that most people feel very strongly (8-10) about how adequately they are paid in their profession.
This is directly inverse to our original hypothesis in that those who are particularly passionate
about their professions, would care about how they are paid. Since a majority of our pollers are
under the teaching college (Figure 2), this could account for the current REDforED movement in
which educators are demanding higher pay, and better funding for Arizona schools.

Figure 2: Majority of students taking this course are Education majors. As you can see from the
graph (Figure 2), majority of the students taking the course, EDT 180, surveyed are in a degree
program in the Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College. The second largest population of students are
in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. I think the relation between the number of students
from each college enrolling in this course has to do with the fact that it is required for their major
because course and graduation requirements vary depending on the major chosen by the student.
The college these students applied to were dependent on what major they chose to pursue at
Arizona State University.
Figure 3: From the students surveyed, more than 120 students said that their happiness is one of
the top three priorities when reflecting on why they chose their major and career. The second
most important priority to the students at ASU was that they wanted to make a difference in the
world with the career path they had chosen. The third most important priority for ASU students,
based on our analysis of the subject, was a close tie between “Getting Ahead and Being
Successful” and “Supporting My Family.”
Figure 4: This graph shows the correlation between major choice, and influence. This was a
multiple selection question, however, 126 of pollers had “my own terms and passions in
common”. This would make sense according to our groups hypothesis, because as figure 2 had
shown, most pollers are enrolled under the teacher’s college. Since there is a large stigma around
teaching, it is expected that having passion for the job is a main driving force in career selection.
Figure 5: Based on the results from Figure 3(Priorities), many see themselves to be happy and
financially successful in the next ten years because of their major choice. Many are optimistic in
hopes that they will not still be paying off credit card debt or student loan debts based on their
choice of major. The major we choose affects the number of years we spend in school, which
may be one of the factors related to why the individual chooses their major.

Analysis
When looking at your data and charts, what conclusions can you come to? What other questions
now come to mind to ask related to your topic? If you did this again, how would you change it?

In conclusion, there are many factors that influence a student to make an important decision in
their life: choosing their career. These questions did succeed in giving us a better understanding;
however, I feel like we could ask more questions to delve deeper into the subject and the
demographic of our surveyors. It is known that some cultures do not allow the student to make
their own career or education choices, rather the parents and family do. Traditionally, individuals
choose their major to ensure they make an abundance of money in order to afford the many
luxuries in life. Fortunately, we can see that happens less for students in America as they are
choosing their careers based on what they think makes them happy. They hope their major will
compensate them well enough for them to put a down payment on a house and being able to have
enough financial freedom to take a vacation a couple times a year.
Questions that come to mind:
● What is your ethnic background?
● Do your cultural values affect what you want to do with your major?
● What is your gender?
● How many times have you changed your major already since starting college?