How to choose a college major when you have no idea

SSelective colleges reward applicants who can say what they came to study, and that asks something strange of a sixteen-year-old. Few have studied psychology, product design or archaeology, and nobody knows whether they love a field they have never touched. So most students either guess, choosing whatever sounds respectable, or leave the question open and hope inspiration arrives before the application is due.

Both approaches cost something. A guessed major rarely matches the rest of the file, and an open one leaves a reader without a reason to champion the student. There is a better way through, which treats the search as a short, deliberate project of a few weeks rather than a wait, and it begins somewhere most students have never thought to look.