Career Guidance for Class 10 students: Career options for Commerce and Humanities stream students

Are you interested in handling numbers, have fun reading and scrutinising numerical data? Then the Commerce stream would be the best choice for you. The Commerce Stream focuses on learning subjects like Business Studies, Economics and Accounting at the High School level. 

A Commerce student can also appear for certain entrance exams in order to pursue college education in reputed business schools and pursue specialised services. Some of the major entrance examinations are:

1.  Common Admission Test (CAT)
2.   Xavier Aptitude Test (XAT) – [Entry into Xavier Institute of Management]
3.   Management Aptitude Test (MAT)
4.   Symbiosis National Aptitude Test (SNAP)
5.   Various examinations conducted by the UPSC

The subjects available in the courses at the Under Graduate Level for Commerce students includes: Business Economics, Financial accounting, Cost accounting, Marketing, Auditing, Income Tax, Business Law and Business Communication. A student of commerce can chose from different occupational roles such as Chartered Financial Analyst, Chartered Accountant, Company Secretary, Cost accountant and can also pursue a Master’s degree in Business Administration.

Commerce students can also play a great role in  MNCs and the banking sector.

Last but not the least, the Humanities Stream has a vast number of subjects and is quite interesting as it involves the study of human culture to a great extent. The major subjects under the Humanities Stream consist of Political Science, History, Geography, Sociology and Psychology. Elective subjects include Physical Education, Painting, Home Science etc. (most of them are common for all streams). A Humanities student can explore courses in Economics, Journalism, Languages, Music, Philosophy, Political Science, Social Work, Vocational Studies, Tourism, Business Administration and Physical Education. Institutions like the IITs provide courses in Social Sciences and Humanities for students of 12^th standard. The IITs offer a five-integrated programme to which students are given admissions through entrance tests like Humanities and Social Sciences Entrance Examination (HSEE). Some of the major entrance exams for Humanities students are as follows:

1.  All India Entrance Examination for Design
2.  National Institute of Design Entrance Exam
3.  National Institute of Fashion Technology Entrance Exam
4. CLAT (Law)
5. Various examinations conducted by the UPSC

Students of the Humanities stream can go for careers in the fields given below:

Law: L.L.B (Bachelor of Law)

Students with Law background can go on to become  a Civil Litigation Lawyer, Criminal Lawyer, Judge, Legal Analyst, Legal Journalist, Document Drafting Lawyer, Government Lawyer, Legal Advisor.

Performing Arts: Courses are available for Music, Dance and Drama (Sangeet Natak Akademi and other state level institutions for perfroming arts)

Candidates from Performing Arts background can become singers, dancers, music composers, musicians, vocalist, instrumentalists, actors and theatre artists.

Travel/Tourism: B.A Tourism, B.A Tourism Studies

Job opportunites for tourism sector are available in travel agencies, immigration and customs services, hotels, tour operation, airlines and government tourism departments.

Media and Journalism: B.A Journalism, Bachelor’s degree in Mass Communication or Mass Media

Work opportunities  for journalists are available in in the areas of educational institutes, advertising agencies, news papers, magazines, portals/websites of publications, radio channels, publishing houses and television channels

Other fields where career opportunities are available for Humanities stream include Psychology, Sociology NGOs, Modelling, Radio Jockeying, Banking, Nursery, Teaching, IT Services, Advertising, Entrepreneurship, Paramilitary services. Students coming from an arts background can further go on to become linguists, historians, museum curators, script writers, actors, language translators and interpreters. The employment scenario for the students of Humanities is quite promising in India in recent times owing to the growing significance of innovations which employ combined expertise from the disciplines of both science and social science. 

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