<p>This is off another post I just made, and wanted to get some input from all of you.</p>
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<p>That pretty much sums it up. When looking at the American educational model we are quickly falling behind other nations in the world and the increasing emphasis on liberal arts may be contributing to it. Many argue that the liberal arts trains students how to think. Is that the case? It may very well be sending students with little work skill out to the world who over analyze everything. I know many of you will disagree</p>
<p>Sure, there is a social aspect involved, but is there overemphasis being put on these students. Repeatedly I see friends who major in something irrelevant to anything in the world (such as art history) find themselves with debt, and little to no options available for decent wages. It seems not to be worth it. I have just been taking into account the huge shift in our economy from a industrial based economy to a services based economy, and am wondering if all this “abstract thinking” is actually reducing our productivity.</p>
<p>Well, for one thing, a “liberal arts education” doesn’t necessarily mean what your post suggests that you think it means. Setting aside what the many values and competitive earning power of a humanities degree may be, a “liberal arts education” does not mean just the humanities or what some call the soft (social) sciences. You can graduate from a liberal arts school with an engineering degree, a degree in biochemistry, etc. </p>
<p>Do you truly believe what you posted, or are you just playing devil’s advocate/looking for some good discussion? When someone posts that he/she thinks art history is irrelevant to anything the world, I have to wonder. (And no, I’m not an art historian ).</p>
<p>By “liberal arts education” I meant a liberal arts major, not an engineering degree from a school with a emphasis on humanities & the arts. I do not think income is what causes us to fall behind others, I have not made the correlation but it is there, inevitably. </p>
<p>I do believe that a Bachelors degree is the new HS diploma. This is in part because of our lack of advancement in our educational system. Not enough students are participating in Sciences and Mathematics because of the emphasis on Art, Humanities, Social Science, and other fields. With the lack of interest in Mathematics & Natural Sciences we are quickly falling behind, it seems obvious that this is due to students increasingly associating difficulty with math and science and choosing a liberal arts education. It seems as through there is a consistent increase in necessity throughout the workforce for superior mathematics and natural science skill, however students are focusing less and less on those fields.</p>
<p>The new paradigm is; High school is for learning entry level “Life skills”. While college is for learning entry level “Career skills”. This nation is not the economic and political power it once was. When I was young, the prevailing thought was: “Get a college degree, and you’ll always have a well paying job.” </p>
<p>For my generation that proved for many to be a very erroneous and costly assumption. </p>
<p>To my mind the U.S. is now mimicking the experience of post WWII Great Brittan. An Empire lost. Low! How the mighty hath fallen. </p>
<p>America, no doubt, needs to re-emphasize math and science. This is indisputable.</p>
<p>However, liberal arts fields are by no means less worthy than math or science. Our culture is equally important as our technological and scientific progress - both must be advanced. Currently, there’s a bit too much of a shift, imo, away from the sciences, but that does not mean the liberal arts are unworthy.</p>
<p>People go into the liberal arts because they enjoy them. What’s the point of breeding a society of mathematicians who really don’t care about what they do? Just because a field may not be high paying doesn’t mean it isn’t worthwhile- perhaps it’s even admirable to sacrifice money for the pursuit of a degree you are happy with. Not everyone ought to be a doctor!</p>
<p>Ummm, maybe if you guys had paid more attention to your liberal arts education, you would know that “liberal arts” basically includes math and science. The medieval liberal arts were essentially grammar, rhetoric, logic, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music. They were distinguished from “mechanical arts” like building or making things (with lots of debate over areas like painting or architecture), or professions – both of which you learned primarily by apprenticeship – or theology.</p>
<p>What liberal arts means today is not at all that everyone is an art history major, but rather that everyone has at least some general familiarity with major areas of inquiry other than the ones with which he or she is primarily involved.</p>
<p>Given the admiration accorded to elite American universities all over the world, and the fierce devotion that all of them have to the liberal arts ideal for undergraduates (including MIT), it is awfully hard to blame any decline in American leadership on that ideal.</p>
<p>Our society started having difficulty producing engineers because our corporations chose pay salespeople, bean counters, and lawyers more and engineers less. Companies are managed not for real growth and production, but for next quarter’s stock price. Since Wall Street commonly penalizes companies for spending money on R&D and rewards them for firing employees, and since executive compensation is often linked to stock performance, what do you think happens? We have created a situation in which instead of producing something, our highest earners simply manipulate funny money. Everyone wants to be a player, not an innovator or creator.</p>
<p>Now engineering is being outsourced to India. Not because Indian engineers are better–the rote learning style of Asia certainly hasn’t succeeded in producing innovators-- but simply because they are cheaper.</p>
<p>I am not referring to the students who are required to take a few humanities classes. I am speaking in regards to emphasis for students to study art, music, english, film, theater, and other non technical areas that are produce less productivity in the workforce. It seems Ironic that as technology advances students are choosing the “fun” majors, as opposed to the majors which will give them skill. </p>
<p>There is an extreme lack of Math & Science in higher education which is getting worse and worse. We are telling our children “study what you find fun” which to me seems boorish. “study what will give you the most opportunity” should be more like it. </p>
<p>I find it ridiculous at many schools there is more emphasis on analyzing Joan Didion novels than there is on taking Calculus. Many schools require students to learn Art, Greek Mythology, Music, but are able to waive mathematics requirements (which typically end with pre-calculus.) The theory is taking all these requirements teach you to “think abstractly,” but I don’t quite understand how thinking abstractly is going to help you get anywhere without any technical skill? </p>
<p>Isn’t it time we put less emphasis on Literature and Art and more on Math and Science. We are falling quickly behind other countries. We need to innovate to stay ahead economically and I don’t see that happening. We already import too many goods. The #1 selling car in the US is a Toyota. Why? Because far superior design & quality engineering, that’s why. </p>
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<p>The American schools are quickly losing prestige. In a country as underdeveloped as India, the entrance exam to IIT requires knowledge of mathematics, (calc 1,2 multi variable, differenetial equations, linear algebra) as well as chemistry and physics taught to our students during their sophmore year of college. </p>
<p>Perhaps as an engineer I am a bit biased, but to be honest most of the art, humanities & social science students I have met are wasting their money, it seems to me they haven’t learned anything except how to over analyze everything.</p>
<p>Although I do think the prevailing sentiment is “study what interests you,” and I think we need to change that, I think that what we need to say is not “math and science are the way to go,” but “find a career that fascinates and motivates you, and study what you need to know in order to pursue it.” People will not perform well in careers that do not motivate them, but if everyone went to school for and chose carefully a career that excited them, there would be so much innovation our computers would start becoming obsolete in weeks instead of months.</p>
<p>However, I do agree that a greater degree of mathematical knowledge should be demanded of the students of today. The Math SAT, for example, was ridiculously easy when I took it at the end of Junior year. The math on it was the math that I had done two years before, in Geometry. There was barely any algebra (and certainly no advanced trig). I think that math is extremely important , not because it necessarily increases productivity in the work force (what use do middle managers have for multivariable calculus?), but because I think that continued study of math necessitates students to think faster. My Physics teacher once complained that, compared to students even three years ago, my class could not do the same problems at the same speed. An education that focuses on the humanities allows for a lot of time to think and ponder and consider, and that’s nice, but I think that people are losing the ability to analyze something quickly and instantly know the answer. My classmates, for example, have to whip out their calculators for something like 7x8 (=56!), because stupid Chicago Math didn’t force us to memorize our times tables. </p>
<p>On a related note, I don’t think that we should be allowed calculators on the SAT or the AP Calc tests. It would be simple enough to not give us problems that require calculators (or not ask for decimal approximations), and I think that people would be a lot better off learning how to do math without those crutches. Half my class spent the entire AP Calc midterm hunched over their calculators, doing every integral with the stupid fInt function. How disgusting.</p>
<p>The immediate recollection of learned material is basically the most important part of performing well in a crisis (and crisis management is an essential aspect of leadership), so I think that even math classes that stress “foundations” could be useful to all college students, especially those who don’t plan on majoring in Math or Physics. (Personally, I plan on majoring in International Relations, so I’m one of those hippy-dippy Humanities people, but this thread has made me at least consider taking a math course in college, assuming I have time for it in between my IR and German classes.)</p>
<p>" I am speaking in regards to emphasis for students to study art, music, english, film, theater, and other non technical areas that are produce less productivity in the workforce. "</p>
<p>Oh…I hope there aren’t many who think the same! Even in historically “technical” cultures, there is an emphasis on the arts…and kids are groomed from a very early age to be musicians, artists, actors etc. Not the way I’d like to see it in the US.</p>
<p>But it would be such a shame if all of those technical kids here who also happen to be spectacular musicians were told to get rid of their instruments so they could take more engineering courses.</p>
<p>And then, there’s the non-technical kids. How sad if they weren’t able to create the wonderful plays, musicals, and art so many of us get so much pleasure from!</p>
<p>I think that part of the problem is that some fields/majors that had once been an undergraduate degree are now what one must study in graduate school. Frankly, I think that can be wasteful and unnecessary. Students are also asked to take core classes at many schools, which can waste time and money (sure it may be nice, but it really is not necessary, IMO. I already know that it is justified as needed to be an educated, well rounded person). The delaying of a degree in one’s chosen field keeps people out of the workplace as long as possible, and it is costly to the student and the family. JMO.</p>
<p>hmm … perhaps this is a case where free market forces will make things work out fine. Instead of talking about our colleges as a monolith let the market decide the breadth of choices that students/families seek. For those of you who want school focused on preparing kids for “good” jobs ASAP I hope there are lots and lots of choices or you. And if my kids ever ask me I’ll suggest they cross all these schools off their list and apply to schools that focus on taking four years to help them learn stuff, learn to think, learn to write, learn to avocate, and become independent compendent young adults … and for my kids I’ll match up this undergrad experience with a pre-professional focused one any day. I am not saying that is the right choice for everyone but I’m hoping my kids have lots of choices like this just as those who want to go the pre-professional route should have lot of choices. </p>
<p>Why does the system have to work one way … and one way only?</p>
<p>At one time, “liberal arts” was the pursue of the leisure class. Now, it seems to be the pre-occupation of the developed world, where you can find sufficient folks wealthy enough to mimic the rich of a bygone era.</p>
<p>Decades ago, a prof of mine educated in pre-revolutionary China told us that while Europe and America put “liberal arts” as the core of an education, and then “orbit” science and math around it, developing countries tend to put science and math as the core of an education, then add liberal arts to the mix. He himself was a great example. While he was an authority on geography, his first degree was a double honors in physics and chemistry.</p>
<p>Why more students are not taking science? I suspect most people can do liberal arts better than science. If students must study science in college, participation rate would plunge. We don’t necessarily want that, do we?</p>
<p>Just a reminder, liberal arts is not “liberal” and it includes “science” (and “math”, too ;)). Just not applied science and math i.e. engineering.</p>
<p>As an example my science nerd kid is at an LAC majoring (currently) in Biology and Chemistry and minoring in Religious Studies. It fits her needs and her desires. If you want to go to a school and never take English, or History, or Philosophy (or Religious Studies???) there are plenty. Take your pick. </p>
<p>Some would argue that our current situation is more because of a lack of vision (or ,if your prefer, a tunnel-vision) and a failure of Americans to see the world as a whole. It seems to me a Liberal Arts (and Sciences) education would be perfect to solve that problem.</p>
<p>mamochka, what is your point? I’m not getting it.</p>
<p>Do you think that people think differently than me? Big whoop. I’m not here to adopt the position of the majority. I’ve been the goat in a roomful of sheep often in my life. It neither bothers me nor riles me. I once had a bandmom try to get me to make meals for the band bus. I declined. She was stunned. I explained my kid never got to eat the meals as she didn’t ride with the band to the games, just back (she played volleyball and we had to drive her to out of town games). I told her when my kid did get to eat the meals (as she wasn’t planning to play forever) I would gladly take my turn in the chute. Her response “You sure do think funny. No one has ever refused my request.” I’m glad I could be the first. ;)</p>
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