Pre-Professionalization at Its Own Expense

A couple weeks ago at the Registered Student Organization (RSO) Fair, I confirmed the rumors I heard about “pre-professionalization” of the College. As I walked through the hundreds of tables with student representatives, I couldn’t help but notice that a disproportionately large share of underclassmen crowded at the east end of the Main Quad. There were so many students herding around these tables, in fact, that I had to nearly push my way through until I could even read the club names. “Maroon Capital,” “Eckhart Consulting,” and “Blue Chips” were some among the most popular tables. Clubs advertising performing arts and creative writing, on the other hand, were nearly empty.

Even in the first days of classes, I had conversations with fellow first year students already working on their applications for many of these pre-professional clubs. When I asked them why they were so set on committing themselves to these clubs—some of which demand greater commitments than classes do—many emphasized that they need to start working towards these jobs now, because it’s difficult to break into an industry as soon as sophomore year, and that these jobs offer financial stability. College is the means to their career. “I’m not here for the life of the mind,” one student told me.

Some of these students boasted of taking the easiest sequence in the Humanities so that they could just get the Core over with. But why treat it like an obstacle?