<p>Re: post #8, fast forward 20 years, and you may find the accountants and engineers working in narrow technical divisions of firms that are run by generalists whose backgrounds are more similar to those you cite who aren’t getting jobs immediately.</p>
<p>It’s not where you start, it’s where you finish. And more importantly, it’s what do you want to do with your life, everyday.</p>
<p>I’m not sure I want a doctor operating on me who’s just in it for the money. :/</p>
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<p>That’s really the key to succeeding in pre-professional programs. You have to know what you want to do for the rest of your life, which I don’t think is that rare. While I didn’t know specifically what job I wanted until my junior year of college, I knew enough to be able to pick my major at the end of high school when applying to colleges.</p>
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<p>While that may be true in some instances, it’s not something you can bank on. Not every one of those people will end up running the technical divisions of firms, so where does that leave everybody else? </p>
<p>Given that you like both a pre-professional program and a liberal arts program equally, the pre-professional one is the safer choice. There are positions waiting for you upon graduation. if you’re an accounting major, you go out and apply for an accountant position. If you’re an engineering major, you go out and apply for an engineering position. If you’re a liberal arts major, things aren’t so clear. You have to be wise in your job search, and seek out the positions that are a good fit for you.</p>
<p>“To me, majoring in a pre-professional major gives the best of all worlds: a better chance of a job and career upon graduation and training in clear thinking, reading and writing, not to mention whatever skills the pre-professional major provides” - I agree wholeheartedly with this from “taxguy”.
It is a mistake in my view to create a false dichotomy between “intellectual” and “pre-professional”. I did both liberal arts and engineering in college, and between the two, if anything, it was engineering that helped more in terms of critical reading and reasoning. I think it is also important to be aware that just having a “pre-professional” degree does not pigeon-hole you any more than a liberal arts degree will. If an English major can find career prospects in an un-related field (which they often times have to do), the same can certainly be said for Engineering and Business majors.</p>
<p>“it was engineering that helped more in terms of critical reading …”</p>
<p>Either my memory is failing me or your program of engineering studies was evidently quite diametrically opposite mine. I don’t recall reading a single word in an engineering class that wasn’t accompanied by a string of mathematical formulae. And I hardly wrote anything, in those classes.</p>
<p>Monydad, didn’t you have to take both english and humanities and/or social science as part of your engineering curriculum?</p>
<p>monydad, your memory may in fact be failing you (sorry, just joking, I know mine is) but I did mention that I took both engineering AND liberal arts in college, so my education was different (though not the diametrical opposite) of yours. I never said anything about writing, although I think engineering helped there as well.<br>
For me the key things engineering taught me in these areas were the habit and discipline of closely following an argument or discourse, reacting to it rationally instead of emotionally, and not letting go of it until I understood what was being said. I don’t know, I get your point about formulae rather than words but I think this benefit applied to engineering as well as non-engineering text books. I learned to write essays with the same kind of focus on internal consistency. And, as I said, I think engineering training put me at an advantage in this as compared to where I would have been, and as compared to many of my fellow students who only took liberal arts.</p>
<p>I think that taking just pre professional classes in college isn’t as advantageous as taking a few liberal arts classes. I’m majoring in engineering and I really enjoy what I take but some of my non-engineering classes have really helped shaped the way I see things in ways I doubt engineering (or science) classes could have done.</p>
<p>Most majors require at least 60 credits outside the major including several liberal arts requirements.</p>
<p>superwizard, agreed. No class, subject or discipline can be all things to all people, and it is beneficial to expose yourself to a variety of things. My argument, though, is that it is false to categorize liberal arts and sciences as “intellectual” pursuits and engineering, business, etc., as being “anti-intellectual”, simply because they involve professional training. I would claim that these two kinds of education can (and do) develop similar intellectual traits and habits, which on many levels are interchangeable. And just in my own case, I think the engineering side did a bit more for me than the liberal arts.</p>
<p>“Monydad, didn’t you have to take both english and humanities and/or social science as part of your engineering curriculum?”</p>
<p>All such classes were given in the College of Arts & Sciences. It was these Arts & sciences courses, not engineering courses, that helped ME more in terms of critical reading. </p>
<p>And that is the difference between my experiences and weldon’s experience. In post #24 Weldon reports being helped, specifically in critical READING, more by engineering courses than by Arts & Sciences courses.</p>
<p>By contrast, MY courses in engineering involved comparatively little reading of English prose. Critical or not critical. </p>
<p>Engineering courses are not Arts & Sciences courses.</p>
<p>I believe critical reading (and writing)skills are critical to success in many upper level positions. Weldon should identify the undergraduate engineering school that proivided him with this result, and I think everyone contemplating studying engineering should strive to attend it.</p>
<p>“I think that taking just pre professional classes in college isn’t as advantageous as taking a few liberal arts classes. I’m majoring in engineering and I really enjoy what I take but some of my non-engineering classes have really helped shaped the way I see things in ways I doubt engineering (or science) classes could have done.”</p>
<p>Some technical courses had that effect for me as well. OK not technical courses, but pure physics anyway. However at this juncture of my life I sincerely wish I spent less time studying technical arcana like fluid mechanics that today I have no use for.</p>
<p>YMMV.</p>
<p>“…these two kinds of education can (and do) develop similar intellectual traits and habits, which on many levels are interchangeable.”</p>
<p>When one path involves extensive reading and writing, and the other involves mathematical quantification almost exclusively and much less reading and writing, I don’t agree that one’s innate skills are developed in exactly the same way through these two types of programs. Moreover I don’t think the store of specific general knowledge one develops is the same either.</p>
<p>A specific intellectual trait and habit that is cultivated in engineering, moreso than liberal arts, is a tendency towards excessive reliance on quantification. I’ve seen this hold back a number of ex-engineers as they attempt to progess towards general managerial jobs. They also sometimes are limited in ability to “think outside the box” and look at the big picture. They were too task-oriented.“Do this and give me the answer” people, not leaders. These were each individuals, but I think their education has something to do with this. Down the road, this can hurt. Once again, it’s not about where you start, but where you wind up.</p>
<p>monydad notes,“I believe critical reading (and writing)skills are critical to success in many upper level positions. Weldon should identify the undergraduate engineering school that proivided him with this result, and I think everyone contemplating studying engineering should strive to attend it.”</p>
<p>Response: How about Harvey Mudd? How about Berkeley and Virginia and Michigan and Cornell and Brown etc.?I am sure that there must be other schools that have strong liberal arts requirements as part of their engineering curriculum.</p>
<p>weldon’s engineering school is superior in that the engineering courses themselves provide superior training in critical reading. Above and beyond the training in critical reading that all engineers may obtain through their liberal arts electives. Including undoubtedly those at weldon’s school.</p>
<p>that’s why weldon’s engineering school is better.</p>
<p>Sadly it has been my observation that many engineers at top schools with demanding liberal arts programs are motivated to suboptimally select their liberal arts electives. Their core program of studies is overly demanding, so they are incentivized to seek easy, non-demanding courses for their free electives. Which are not typically the courses that have the most extensive reading and writing demands. They frequently gravitate to courses like economics that have almost no writing requirements and have concepts that are essentially math in disguise.</p>
<p>I imagine that in some (at least)cases they are probably simply less good at reading and writing than at math, relatively speaking, and don’t want to be competing for grades in these non-core (for them)classes with pre-law students and possibly getting bad grades. Which further suboptimally influences their free electives course selection.</p>
<p>The result being that such students are suboptimally educated in the liberal arts, even given the limitations of their comparatively limited slots for studying liberal arts in the first place.</p>
<p>Complete aside: I think it’s good to become proficient in a foreign language too. This is certainly more easily accomplished, and usually required, within a liberal arts curriculum.</p>
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<p>I completely agree. While they are very different I think its unfair to label engineering or business as ‘anti-intellectual’. That in my opinion is ludicrous.</p>
<p>monydad, I never said that the skills developed through different disciplines were “exactly the same”, only “similar”. And of course the store of “specific general” (??) knowledge will not be the same: I wouldn’t expect to learn much about tribology or compressible fluid flow by studying the Reformation or Modern Portuguese, and visa-versa. But maybe (just maybe) you can read and analyze an historical account of Martin Luther a little more effectively due to your engineering training, and possibly an English major through enhanced communication skills can begin to understand the critical points of some technical issues.
PS- with regard to my engineering school, I believe it may be one’s particular experience that counts, not the place. Of course it may also be that you are simply being sarcastic.</p>
<p>There seems to be an assumption that these more general critical reading and thinking skills are acquired in a college curriculum or not at all. I suspect few law schools would be content graduating people whose thinking skills were not far better than even an outstanding student coming out of undergrad. </p>
<p>I knows lots of hard scientists whose critical thinking, and writing, skills run rings around terrific college kids majoring in literature or other liberal arts.</p>
<p>College is the start of higher education, but hopefully not the end, even for people who do not go on to advanced degrees.</p>
<p>Here’s what you do. Enroll in Penn’s College of Arts & Sciences. Major in something liberal artsy. Take some Wharton classes on the side. Boom.</p>
<p>I want to revive this debate.</p>
<p>I think one of the problems with this discussion is that everyone misunderstood what those who “attack preprofessionalism” want. It’s not that they value liberal arts per se, but that they value broad knowledge; the problem they have with preprofessionalism is that it is too specialized. This problem applies to those who focus solely on one liberal arts field, as well as in the so called “chinese menu program” (think Brown University and Harvard’s Dean Elliot, who advocated free-choice in class selection. The consequence was students picking classes based on what they liked rather than on interconnectedness and understanding).</p>
<p>Broad knowledge is important because it places what we learn in context (I’m taking this argument from Hutchin’s University of Utopia). Doesn’t it ever bother you guys when one field proposes a solution to a problem that another field rejects? It’s weird because both fields are respected and thorough, yet they still conflict. This is because there is OFTEN little cooperation between various departments. And, if cooperation were to be implemented, a shared academic “language” must be known by all members so that they can understand each other. The solutions to most of the worlds problems are not rooted in one specialization, but in multiple.</p>
<p>Broad knowledge also helps uphold democracy, as the OP mentioned. This is because democracy rests on an educated population that values SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS. Democracy fails when there is too much self-interest; rather, people should be working for social unity (people say this is impossible given human nature, but Japanese culture proves them otherwise. You’d know that from a basic Cultural Anthropology course). If people are too technical focused, they TEND (notice I didn’t say always as to not offend anyone) to be utilitarian-focus. A broad education in the liberal arts could reverse this trend by instilling a sense of cohesiveness in a society (think Thomas Lewis’s interpretation of James Lovelock’s Superorganism), as well as respect for intuition; as Andrew Delbanco of Columbia’s Core argued (paraphrase), “the liberal arts is what showed us that there is inherent value in human life as opposed to the Darwinian approach of eugenics. Liberal arts will show us other things like this.” He also argues that the liberal arts is what helps us detect ‘********’ and understand other fields. Think of UChicago’s ex-dean Donald Levine’s warning about the consequence of our neglect of the liberal arts (paraphrase): “We live in a world in which despite constant evidence for global warming, people have rejected it; a world in which despite the warning of academia and experts that the war in iraq would have minimal utility, our leaders still went through with it.” People seem to be stuck in their ways; they believe in many things not because it has been proven to them, but because it was the way they have always done things (I don’t mean this as an attack on religion, for spiritual and artistic development plays a part in the education of man, as John Dewey(?) mentioned). </p>
<p>Now for critical reading skills, etc. This is not the purpose of the liberal arts, though it is a benefit. As I said, liberal arts helps develop the human, including his moral and “understandingness” aspects. If critical reading, etc was the goal, then my side would approve of “chinese menu programs.” However, what we emphasize is shared knowledge. E.D. Hirsch in Cultural Literacy argues that America is in a crisis of literacy. For example, in the past businessmen would send letters to each other with cultural references to things like Shakespeare, and all parties would understand it (I can’t verify this since I am too young; I’m in undergrad right now. Anyway, his timeframe is around the 70-80s). Nowadays however (major companies at the time complained of this) is that young businessmen can’t understand businessmen of other generations or businessmen of different cultures, making communication harder. Hirsch argues that our society is reaching a point of only generational understand, not inter generational and cross-cultural (obviously there have always existed a special generational understanding, but not to the extent of now). The danger of this is it hurts cultural cohesion, for we lose a sense of our shared heritage, and of international appreciation. Broad studies aims to correct this. </p>
<p>But why does the government, and many of the public, emphasize technical fields (technical fields is not only preprofessional ones, but science ones as well). It’s because they are measurable aspects of success. What the humanities does it it helps develop the human being; it shows us what is important and what we should value (e.g. eugenics is bad). As someone has told me, “technical fields is more necessary for the nation, but humanities is more important.” As such, we shouldnt neglect either. Sadly, the trend is that we are neglecting the humanities; Humanities professors in Stanford complained about this in the NYT article about Stanford’s focus on startups. </p>
<p>What does this mean for preprofessionalism? Well, the goal is that everyone should study broadly and cohesively in their undergrad. This is to instill values, understanding, and the skills necessary for lifelong learning. Specialization should then be pursued post-grad. (think getting a BA in History, then going to med-school). </p>
<p>Now we come to the reality. College is ****ing expensive in America. Should a student waste time with a liberal arts degree? I still think so, though I am less adamant in arguing this point because I know life is hard. The reason I think liberal arts should be strived for against majors with more stable futures is because it is important to develop ourselves; life shouldn’t be a manic pursuit for the next job. I sincerely would rather be a homeless, educated man, than a rich, superficial businessman who screws people over. I think there is inherent value in being self-cultivated, but in modern western society, we don’t recognize it. Let me relay my point through cultural comparison: in America, we like to compare ourselves with others to measure our success (money, cars, houses, children). In Japan however, they value introspective success; that is, a person is successful on his own terms. This is why Japan, as a developed nation, still retains a strong industrial base. It is also why they have the concept of a (I don’t remember the Japanese word for it) person who strives to be the best at his trade (think Jiro Ono, the sushi chef) and that is his duty, even if he has a low-trade. Anyway, a liberal arts degree isn’t a path to unemployment; it is harder to get a job yes, but not impossible. In this path, at least you would get the utility of being cultivated along with your your job. </p>
<p>It really boggles my mind why education is not subsidized as much in this country. We need to reduce the cost of learning so that people can comfortably pursue non-technical majors. However, if we keep upholding the idea that liberal arts are wish-washy, we will never move in the proper direction. And as long as people aren’t educated in the liberal arts, people will never understand what the right direction is. </p>
<p>Sorry for my bad grammar and spelling.</p>
<p>You should have made a new thread instead of bumping a 3 year old one</p>
<p>^Um, 5 year old one…</p>
<p>But I agree.</p>