Take a look at some of the easy college majors offered at schools across the country. Should you choose an easy major?
Earning a degree is going to be tough, and it’s important that you pick a field that will help you get to where you want to be in your future career.
Beyond that, some college majors are easier than others in workload, time commitment, and grading.
What Makes a Major Easy?
There’s nothing wrong with wanting to earn a college degree with as little effort as possible. That would allow you more free time and the opportunity to explore what your passions are. Also, if you have a high GPA it can mean that your overall chances of landing a high-paying job or being accepted to grad school are increased.
Your own personal strengths will feed into how well you’re able to master a subject.
But what makes a major easy? We will be looking at college majors that tend to give students higher grades.
On the other hand, a difficult major is more likely to have students earn lower grades because of the difficult subject matter.
This has a lot to do not only with the professors and the amount of work they assign but with the subject matter. For example, a major such as art can be very subjective, with no right or wrong answer. This might mean that it would be more difficult to give a student a low grade.
10 Easy College Majors With High GPAs
An economics professor at Wake Forest University conducted a study at a liberal arts school from 1997 to 2007 in which he examined 20 different college majors and found that the following majors were the easiest because the students had higher GPAs.
- Education
- Language
- English
- Music
- Religion
- Sociology and Anthropology
- Art
- History
- Computer Science
- Philosophy and Religious Studies
The study also found that the harder degrees typically involved math or science. These included courses in chemistry, psychology, math, geology, physics, philosophy, economics, biology and political science.
Easy Majors at Different Types of Schools
In a recent New York Times article, author David Glenn said that if you go to business school the easiest areas of study are management and marketing. That’s because the bulk of work is group- related, with students not individually accountable for their efforts.
If you attend a liberal arts school, majors such as art history, American studies and communications might be relatively easy college degrees to earn. (And we’re not advocating taking the easy way out. You’ll get out of college what you put in!)
It All Comes Down to You
In the end, though, the ease of a major will come down to you and the skill sets you bring with you to college.
Your own personal strengths will feed into how well you’re able to master a subject. For example, while you may be a poor reader you could really excel at math. That should be taken into account when you choose a major.
Other factors that should be considered are your personal study habits and how disciplined you’ll need to be for a specific major.