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Welcome to the English Department's Home Page
English department chair: David Fabish ◊ Office: LA-M ◊ Phone: x2824
Dean of Liberal Arts: Dr. Linda Rose ◊ LA Division Office ◊ Phone: x2801
FALL 2008 Newsletter Now Online!
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Faculty | English Majors |
Ever consider becoming an English Major?
You should.
English majors benefit from one of the most diverse and versatile of academic tracks. The perception that many people have--English majors are either future teachers or future starving poets--is frequently untrue. Instead, students who begin their English major at Cerritos College and transfer to a four-year university for their bachelor's degree discover that three qualities of their studies set them apart from other majors in the job market:
- advanced critical thinking and analytical skills
- creative problem solving and persuasive argument abilities
- strong writing skills and a facility with language
Employers know that students with a degree in other disciplines tend to have a strong depth of knowledge--they know their field well--but often lack the breadth of knowledge that will make them more valuable in the workplace. In a September 2000 article on the CNN Money website, Ernest Suarez, a professor at The Catholic University of America, reports that the English major is valuable to a variety of business environments. ""A lot of our students have hooked up with private businesses... Businesses tell us they like to hire English majors because they feel that they can think. They've got the writing and analytical skills they need. The rest they can be trained to learn." While many job applicants and employees vying for promotion possess specific workplace talents, they are often anxious about their writing and speaking skills or limited in their ability to read a text and interpret it in business, law, medical, or other professional arenas. English majors practice those skills, and employers find their higher-level thinking abilities highly desirable.
Additionally, many English majors enter into fulfilling careers in education, journalism, advertising, television--and some do become poets.
Last, but certainly not least, students often choose a major in English because it allows them to gain valuable insight into their own lives. Reading a short story by Sandra Cisneros or Raymond Carver, a poem by John Milton or Gary Soto, a novel by Charlotte Bronte or Toni Morrison, or a play by Arthur Miller or Lorraine Hansberry, broadens their sense of the world, their readerly experience, and their insights into the human condition. As writers, they imprint their own creative perspectives on the world, producing new metaphors that will help the rest of us make sense of our experience. English majors often find they are linked in a community of readers and writers, joined in an enlightening and engaging human conversation.
Click on the English Majors button at the top of the page for more info on career paths and literary endeavors.