Although what pope is saying is a good idea the excrement BU and other schools are pulling is crap. They arent stopping you from declaring a major so you can explore what you want to do they are stopping you so they can get more of your money.
Yes kids should stop hopping on the college train so early to figure out what they actually want to do in life, but they shouldnt be required to take biology, physics, and calculus if you want to be a creative director for an advertising agency. Its a shame and a waste of thousands of dollars.
If you already know what you want to do, the option is there to apply to the program you'd like (ex. the School of Engineering). The College of General Studies is simply a place for students to take all of the required "liberal arts" courses while learning about different fields of dedicated study until they determine their chosen major, rather than at the same time.
If your argument is that students shouldn't take a breadth of courses outside of their major, and should instead take only courses directly related to their major, then we're in direct disagreement. Broad studies are important for the brain; that's been established through centuries of science. Students exposed to broad studies become better thinkers/problem solvers.
I took a specialized program in college and even I had to take 3 semesters of math, accounting, writing, history, etc. I've long regretted not putting in more effort in my accounting coursework. You don't realize how important your non-major work is until you actually need it.
EDIT: Also, just because you
want to be the creative director of an ad agency doesn't mean you
will be. It would be a lot more disingenuous for a school to prepare you for a pigeonholed position and leave you completely unprepared to do anything else when it doesn't work out.