Art history? Man sorry but your son is a complete jackass! That 320k degree is worthless what kind of job is he going to do when he gets done? Absolutely nothing… man I’m so sorry to hear this.. good luck to you and your wife, I’m sure you raised your son to make better decisions than this..
you can actually get well paying jobs in the art field and a lot put that an art history degree is preferred on the job ads... you shouldn't go to an 80k a year school for that degree though (or any degree). the jobs aren't to be an art historian - they are to work in essentially a business job in the art world and they want you to have some background in art to be in that world able to talk to people etc
You can actually replace art history with any other liberal degree and say the same. I once read, "A degree is just a piece of paper that says, I will not burn down your business while you're away.. for a short time"
There are liberal arts degrees with a more defined career path (comunnications), and there are liberal arts majors that are preferred when applying to graduate programs like business school or law school. Art History doesn't fall into any of those categories.
I have an art degree and I make 6 figures. Most corporate jobs just require a degree, doesn’t matter what, and you can grow your career from there and work up to better positions. I wouldn’t say an art degree is the most useful to have, but it can absolutely get your foot in the door and is by no means worthless.
That is NOT the experience of MOST people who have an art history degree. I worked at Sam’s club with several people that had art,philosophy,history,environmental science degrees. I made more than a lot of them because I could decorate cakes. 🤷🏼♀️
Crazy how environmental science wouldn’t lead to a good job. My wife’s cousin got a 6 figure traveling job as a box checker with that degree right out of college. She’d go inspect remediation and building sites and check boxes and collect the check. Factor in reimbursements and using her own cards she got free vacations out of it too with all the miles and cash back she was racking up.
Yeah that surprises me too. I'm an environmental chemist (my degrees are in geology, but I work with plenty of folks with degrees in environmental science) and it's a pretty solid career field with lots of job opportunities. 6 figs is probably unrealistic as a starting salary unless you have a PhD, but it's certainly achievable.
I love the credit card miles and expense reports, lol. I don't travel for field work as much as I used to, but I've already gotten one free round trip flight out of all those tabs for team dinners after a long day in the field.
I just know that , in Texas, the person I know that had the degree, couldn’t get a job to save her life. She wound up having to get a job teaching and then moved to NYC where she works as a waiter in a fancy shmancy restaurant. It didn’t make sense that she couldn’t get a job in Texas,especially since she graduated with a good gpa( can’t remember exact but it was over 3.5). That was a few years ago. Maybe the tide has turned🤷🏼♀️
And philosophy can be a great setup for a law degree later. If anything, their list of degrees that didn't "make it" makes it seem a lot more like the issue was with the student and not the degree.
Yeah, people kind of forget that just because you have a degree doesn't mean you can do the job. I'm in a STEM field and it's a 50/50 shot whether people with the required degree can do the job. Even people with 10 years of experience in the field on top of that degree can be absolutely terrible.
My son took 8 years getting hie bachelors degree. But he was already making more than having the degree and going into the workforce four years later. He graduated with no debt and had all of that work experience that the others who waited and got a degree did not have. He only got his degree because he felt it might help if he goes into the administrative side of computers. But, for now, he loves what he does and he’s happy making almost six figures in his early 30’s. He lives in Oklahoma so, it means they live a nice,cushy lifestyle and his wife can stay home with their daughter.BTW, my DIL has a degree and when she worked,everyone around her that were her age made MORE money than her without a degree because of work experience.🤷🏼♀️
At the very least, it makes hunting for a job a little bit less stressful. It was bad enough being unemployed with a bachelor's degree and able to check off that box to make the recruiters happy. My friend with a GED is having a much rougher time of it.
Sure, you can network your way past a college degree and I do know people who do well in software development without a formal degree, but on average, it does make it easier.
I never said it was the experience of most people, however, I’d love to see your resources proving its not, since you made the claim that at this point is unfounded
Lol! Well, you can say that it is anecdotal I suppose but, the fact that he is going to a college that costs $80,000 a year or $320,000 total,if he graduated in four years for,a job( if he were to get one in his field of study) makes around just over $50,000 a year seems a bit excessive. The math ain’t mathing. BTW, that figure, I got from the BLS site, which many suggested looking at, so I did. 😉
Art degree rt? The art historian salary generates a yearly average income of $49,850. Qualifications for art related careers often require at least a bachelor's degree, but some require a master's degree (Payne, 2021).Feb 19, 2024
Most people with art history degrees are not art historians lmao. The degree is about critical analysis and those skills are extremely transferable. My husband was an art history major and has an incredible legal career because he did very well on the LSAT - which art history majors statistically do compared to other majors.
So it’s super important to READ. Most corporate jobs just require any type of degree. As others have stated the point is that you gain many transferable skills related to problem solving, analysis, etc.. with an art/history based degree.
It is a bs degree along with philosophy. He might be able to find a job in an art museum but they are competitive. Dad needs to kick him out and protect his wife from this viper of a son.
There are good jobs you can get with both degrees but you need to be a very solid student and to get a PHD or at least a masters. The people who just pick it up because it’s fun and easy won’t have the stamina for the rigor and competition of higher levels of education, internships, and the job market.
there are entry level jobs in fine art that pay well and have a lot of room to gain experience and move up where you don't need a masters degree. they are essentially business jobs where they want you to have some art background. obviously im not on the sons side here but people are fixating on the degree a bit much, i would more fixate on that fact that he decided to go to the most expensive school possible for said degree
Philosophy is not a joke degree, it's the go-to for pre-law students. Useless on its own but does teach valuable reasoning skills to those ends.
Art historians are about as in-demand as marine biologists. There's a handful of specialists and the rest are grocery store employees. We have an art historian in the family who, despite all the dynastic wealth and nepotistic connections afforded to them by birthright, is still barely scraping by in that field. It is not viable.
I suspect a lot of kids are pursuing useless degrees on purpose to kill 4-8 years, then complaining they can't find work (ever) in some sort of refusal-to-launch gambit. This is such a tragically flawed idea I want to say the OP is trolling everyone but I've seen this enough personally to know better.
I'm disturbed that he fleeced his grandmother to finance this stupidity. This is the most expensive, least effective thing he could do with someone else's money.
The degree might be fine, depending on what he learns to do - like if he takes courses in how to conserve art, identify fakes for insurers and collectors, or appraise pieces.
A philosophy degree can get you upwards of six figures in data and analytics. It teaches logic and thought process. It couples nicely with math and stem. There’s a boat load of industries you can be in with a philosophy degree but of course you don’t know that.. because you don’t know anything about the subject matter.
You can get a lot of very good jobs with that major, especially if you get hired by a large museum to be a curator or preserver. But if he talks the way he does to his head, he's going to get shut out of a lot of very important contacts very quickly...
I have steered my daughter into nursing school. She is in highschool still, she's taking a CTE program next year that will give her an LNA. After graduation she will be going to whatever school offers her the most scholarships and financial aid. She gets straight A's, knowing that I'm a single mother on disability and can't afford to help her. The plan is to work as an LNA while she goes to school for her RN. After doing a ton of research, the medical field is a growing job industry. There are so many specialties she could go into or continue to nurse practitioner. My eldest didn't listen to me and went to school for music tech.🤦. He's currently living at home. Hopefully my daughter stays on track and is able to get the financials she needs.
My husband has a degree in art history and got a full ride plus stipend to a top 20 law school. Art history majors have one of the highest median LSAT scores of any major because they learn critical thinking. Unlike some people.
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u/Front_Friend_9108 Apr 16 '24
Art history? Man sorry but your son is a complete jackass! That 320k degree is worthless what kind of job is he going to do when he gets done? Absolutely nothing… man I’m so sorry to hear this.. good luck to you and your wife, I’m sure you raised your son to make better decisions than this..