Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

Minor in Business, Major in Benefits

What do you do with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English? At this moment, I’m not optimistic about my job prospects. Even the stereotypical English-major-turned-teacher path isn’t an immediate option, as more and more states – including my home state of Rhode Island – are requiring education degrees, which Georgetown doesn’t offer.

So what’s a poor schlub like me, armed with no useful business skills – or at least not the kind one would put on a résumé – to do in this already-tight job market? I’ll start by applauding the joint efforts of the College Academic Council, Georgetown College dean Chester Gillis and McDonough School of Business dean George Daly to implement a new business minor for students in the College. If approved, it will become available within the next two years (just in time for me to graduate without it), and it can’t come soon enough. It is a travesty that McDonough School of Business students have access to the same upper-level English courses that I – as an English major – should theoretically get preference in, and yet I am restricted from taking even the most basic marketing or management courses. Leaving aside the worst-kept secret that there are no legitimate university-sponsored networking opportunities for non-business majors, students in the College suffer a further disadvantage: a lack of opportunities to learn directly-translatable business skills due to the severely limited coursework available to us. In other words, as the character Princeton sings in “Avenue Q,”Four years of college and plenty of knowledge have earned me this useless degree. I can’t pay the bills yet, `cause I have no skills yet!”

I won’t bother to speculate as to why students in the College have been denied the inter-school opportunities available to our MSB peers. I will say, however, that the move by the CAC and the aforementioned deans is a step in the right direction. I strongly believe that anyone paying our absurdly high tuition – even NHS and SFS students – should be able to have a reason to be in Hariri other than to gawk at the freakishly tall statue of that businesswoman. (Then again, that statue may be part of another plot to scare us off.) But I will not be so easily deterred. Never mind that the proposed business minor would require almost as many courses (seven) as my actual major. Never mind that I would have to be on suicide watch all through accounting, or that I would likely use what I learned in finance to fund my eBay addiction instead of high-rolling a major corporation. Never mind that I dropped macroeconomic theory after the first homework assignment. I have no secret ambitions to be an investment banker, but why should the MSB kids be the only ones who get to write off a round of golf as a business expense? In my case, I’ll be lucky if I can afford to buy a set of clubs (though I’m sure eBay could help me out there.) However, with a business minor – or at least the opportunity to dabble in interesting/useful coursework such as social entrepreneurship or web marketing – I would stand a better chance of getting my “product” out there.

Implementing the minor is the right move and long overdue. I only hope the university can clear away the inane bureaucratic red tape in time to make this minor available to as many students as possible.

Colin Nagle is a junior in the College. He can be reached at naglethehoya.com. Getting in Tune appears every other Monday at www.thehoya.com.

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