I wanted to do a minor in math since the beginning of second year, so I planned out all my courses, but now I'm having second thoughts about it.
I need 9 courses to obtain a minor in math and right now I only have 2. So I basically have to use all my electives from now on to take math courses if I want the minor. The thing is, I'm also shooting for a good GPA and that might be pretty difficult if I take a lot of math courses.
The academic counsellor told me a minor isn't all that useful, because jobs don't really care if you have a minor or not. Can someone clarify this?

Thank you.

I think minor is just for your own interest. If you are planning on going to teacher's college, having a minor may be essential to have.

In my case, I was in Honours Linguistics and I was minoring in Geography. So I was taking geography courses along with Linguistics and language courses. Because of low CA, I had to switch out of linguistics and decided to pursue my minor program instead.

Minors are useless unless you plan on teaching.

thx for the aware... did not know that

I am not sure how you figure that a minor is worth nothing unless you want to be a teacher. If your minor centers around a skill then it can be very useful to have. For example, students with the minor in GIS have been very successful landing jobs, and that is a fact, not a matter of opinion. I am sure other minors like Computer Science for example can be equally useful.

Like anything else you do at university it largely depends on what your minor/degree choice is in and it up to each student to evaluate how useful their choice is in helping them reach their goals. Sure there are minors (and degrees for that matter) that are for general interest only, but you can't paint all of them with the same brush.

Originally Posted by Moghue

Minors are useless unless you plan on teaching.

Not even really true. For a second teachable you need 6 courses.

Originally Posted by Biochem47

Not even really true. For a second teachable you need 6 courses.

...which you get from a minor (need 24 units=8 classes).

Originally Posted by Goran

...which you get from a minor (need 24 units=8 classes).

I think the point is that you don't necessarily need a minor to get the teachable. The teachable comes from the 6 courses you get from the minor, not the fact that you officially "completed a minor". The usual thought is that you already need 6 courses, so why not take 2 more and get a minor? But technically it still isn't a requirement nor is it technically any more useful than just taking the 18 units for the teachable.

A minor is more so for your own interest, and a great way to stand out amongst others in an application process.

For instance, if you're applying for further schooling and you majored in Political Science and minored in Economics, it doesn't "stand out" as much because they are plenty of people who specialize in these two fields.

However, if you majored in some Engineering stream and minored in, say, Theatre and Film, -that- is unique, and employers will remember you all the better for it.

Originally Posted by pdel21

I am not sure how you figure that a minor is worth nothing unless you want to be a teacher.

From every employer, professor, co-worker, and guidance counsellor I've talked too. I think its pretty much a consensus that they are not all that impressive/important. As said above, it is for your own interest only.

When I was deciding whether to go ahead with a maths minor or not, I went to an academic advisor with the same question you have. She basically shut me down on the whole it being useful thing and forced me to acknowledge that if I wanted to do it, it would be because I wanted to, and not because it'd 'look good' with my degree.

So yeah, it depends on why you want to go for it. It definitely takes up all your electives (which is a bummer since there are so many other courses I would have loved to take), but I think it's worth it, personally, if you're really interested in maths.

Originally Posted by Quiver

I think the point is that you don't necessarily need a minor to get the teachable. The teachable comes from the 6 courses you get from the minor, not the fact that you officially "completed a minor". The usual thought is that you already need 6 courses, so why not take 2 more and get a minor? But technically it still isn't a requirement nor is it technically any more useful than just taking the 18 units for the teachable.

Exactly. Thank you!

I'm applying to teacher's college for a second teachable in bio. I have 6 courses, not a minor. Don't like bio enough to take another two courses.

Thanks for the response everyone.