Why are we supposed to focus on one subject in college?

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When you go to college, everyone expects you to know what you want to go for. It's ingrained in us that if you have a college degree you will make more money throughout your life. To be honest, I've never really wanted to go to college. The reason I'm going to college is because of societal pressure. I've never had a particular career set in my mind. I've changed my major 5 or 6 times throughout college. The final major that I went with was history, but I'm not that interested in it. I'm currently a senior and have been going to school for the past 7 years. I was supposed to be graduating this weekend, but I could not handle this senior seminar class that required me to write a 30 page paper on a narrowed topic, come up with a thesis, and make arguments and main points. Instead, my advisor changed my major to Integrative Studies which requires me to write a 15-20 page paper connecting the top two subjects that I have studied throughout college which are criminology and history. This new paper seems more doable than the senior seminar paper. After I write this new paper, I could graduate by the end of the summer or the fall, depending on how long it takes me to write it. Anyway, back to my original point. How are you expected to stay focused on one thing throughout college? People change and new interests can develop. How are you supposed to know at 18 or 22 what you want to do with the rest of your life? When I tell people that my major is history, I get asked what I plan to do with it. I don't know how to answer it because I'm not that interested in it and I'm just going for the degree. Once I get this degree which will now be in Integrative Studies, I have no desire to go to graduate school and I want nothing to do with history or writing papers again.

For job prospects

Although you have general education

And history itself is multidisciplinary


Teacher

Historian

Librarians

For an accounting or electrical engineering major to be accountants and engineers is one thing

Sociologist?
Anthropologist
Psychologist
Historian
Philosopher



Liberal arts major, a lot of subjects

I understand that if you are going for a particular career and know exactly what you want to do then you should stick to one subject. If you don't have a particular career in mind and you are just going to get a degree then you shouldn't be required to declare a major. You should be able to take classes in all kinds of different subjects and find out what you like and don't like. Our interests change. People change jobs and careers all the time. Why should there only be one path or only one area of focus? I never knew about this Integrative Studies degree. I think it is better than going for a Bachelor's degree in something that you are not that interested in.

Great at one subject, slightly good at a lot of subjects

Some colleges offer General Studies

I did not write the rules

But I think college is overrated

College is not a mystery, magic, special, cool, panacea, be all end all

College is not all it's cracked up to be

I had the opposite problem. I wanted to focus on just one subject, but I needed take five classes a semester to graduate! Fortunately, studies were easy enough that I got good grades anyway. And I remember being really good in a number of classes that I took.

The reason for this scheme is so you don't spend 7 years in college. Most colleges require a certain amount of "breadth" (classes not in your major) as well as a concentration in one subject. Ideally all this can be completed in about 4 years.

I get the feeling you haven't done much serious thinking about how you are going to live after college. Are you independently wealthy? Or just planning to live with Mom forever? Are you planning to go on disability? If you plan to work, do you have reason to think you can work? Will there be a large student debt from your 7 years in college? How are you going to pay that off?

The reason why you are required to declare a major in college is to get you into a program of study with specific classes. Why? So that you can take the appropriate classes to learn the required skills for that major and to prepare for a potential job in that area of study. If you just randomly take classes, how is that going to build a useable skill set to work with? One needs to plan ahead to make it in this world.

College is not for everyone. My youngest nephew is now a licensed plumber because he went the trade school route. He will likely make more than me over time. Money has not been my motivator though, I want knowledge that you only get with research.

The other reason, is to get good at anything you need to specialize. Many fields become too complex to be juggled at the same time. It would be great to be able to write out equations describing fluid flow in a piping system and translate writings by ancient egyptians, but both of those are pretty hard for most people and doing them both impossible for most people.