I get this question all the time. Part of my job as a Starbucks employee requires me to be talkative with customers and hold conversations. Something I get asked all the time is if I’m attending college, which one, and what I’m going to school for. I believe there’s more answers for this question than just spouting off my major and minor, and the job that I hope to be more applicable for someday. There’s typically goals a person sets for him or herself that go along with choosing a career path. There typically is a motive for sinking thousands of dollars into the potential opportunity at a successful career. So next time someone asks me, “what are you going for?”, I’ll have to have a better answer than just “communication and photojournalism.”

“What are you going for?” I can think of a lot of things. A diploma, a career, success, security, experience… the same as every other college attendee. Depending on a persons major and minor, however, it may not be obvious what goal someone is seeking to achieve after college. For example, nursing majors obviously have a pretty good idea of what they’d like to be doing after they graduate. There’s different kinds of nursing, but that title of a nurse is still the light at the end of the tunnel. Its pretty self-explanatory what that person is in college for. Then, there are the majors that aren’t so obvious. Art majors, psychology majors, communication majors. These more creative paths, I feel, hold more extensive options.

I am a communication major and a photojournalism minor. The possibilities are expansive for communication majors in general, but adding on a photojournalism minor lends me even more options after graduation. It’s a good thing to have choices, but it can also be scary. Fear of making the wrong decisions can influence my choices. I could be afraid to make mistakes or take risks and miss out on amazing opportunities. With communication, I could go into advertising, marketing, sales, public relations, and such. With photojournalism, I could get involved with broadcast television or radio, news print, magazine, blogging, or reporting. Combining the two gives me an incredible amount of options, and opens a lot of doors.

Along with “what are you going for?”, I also get a lot of “what job do you hope to get?” Again, I could just talk about the typical jobs people associate with communication or photojournalism. Advertising, news writing, marketing, or reporting. But to me, those all sound too ordinary. I hope to freelance, photographer, journalist, writer. I also have hopes to own my own studio someday and work full-time for myself. But, if you’d ask me what my ultimate dream job would be, it would be a freelance photojournalist for National Geographic.

So, next time someone asks me, “what are you going for?”, ill have a much better answer than just my college concentrations. If they have the time to listen, I can tell them all about my aspirations to become a media artist with writing and photography, and maybe someday travel the world for National Geographic. Therefore, what am I going for? My dreams.