I’ve heard the same thing about trying to write poetry. But, of course, what are the odds that you’d want to without having first had a liberal arts education?
Two points.
- This thread was originally about top small colleges vs. top universities. One could major in philosophy at either (e.g., either Amherst or Yale). One could major in engineering at either Columbia or Swarthmore. The size of school does not necessarily equate with the pragmatic nature of a major.
- Why assume that any career outcome is "disappointing"? If we spoke with the au pair or barista and they were in that job because they could not find another, well, that's one thing. But maybe they wanted that job and did not try for another; maybe that au pair thought that being an au pair in another country for a year or two after college would be a great way to learn about another culture.
Not everyone is interested primarily in money, either. I went to a top college and then became a public school teacher, then administrator. That was what I wanted to do. Could I have earned more as an investment banker or consultant (perennial favorite career choices for Williams graduates)? Yes, sure, but I would not have found that personally fulfilling. And when I first went to Williams, I had no idea what career I would want. It did not matter. I wanted the intellectual experience of four years immersed in the life of the mind. I LOVED college, and am so glad that I had a liberal arts experience at a school that did not offer a single education course at the time, rather than majoring in education somewhere. I think that my undergraduate experience developed my thinking and aided my eventual career success much, much better than did my graduate classes in education-- most of which were pretty inane (with the exception of student teaching and a very few courses).
I hope colleges are never ranked solely by graduates’ mid-career salary, etc. A world in which no one becomes an artist or poet or philosopher or linguist or theoretical mathematician, is not much of a world.
Is is fanciating. D1 majored in philosophy. Her junior year, she was accepted to study at the renown Yale Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics 2 month summer program. http://bioethics.yale.edu/
Her research earned her an invitation to present her work at a Harvard symposium on bioethics. After graduation, she was employed by Harvard for a year. She then was hired by a healthcare company founded by two MIT alumni and is now a director. If asked, and I have, she’ll credit much of her success to the critical thinking and writing skills she learned in her philosophy courses. I believe that writing and subsequently defending a thesis was also extremely beneficial.
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If college were free, then bless their heart and let the kids study whatever they want. Unfortunately, it is not free, and Amherst will cost us $250,000 for a bachelors degree. If any school wants us to pony up that amount of money, I want to see a return on investment and not some nebulous “life of the mind” nonsense.
That does sound fascinating, but are there enough jobs like that to justify someone to get a philosophy degree?
The vast majority of jobs don’t require a specific major.
I remember hearing a CEO talking about why he likes liberal arts graduates.
“I can teach someone the skills they need to do the job but I can’t teach them to reason well. I want graduates with strong critical thinking and communication skills. The rest they can learn on the job.”
Why in the world would this CEO think that only applies to liberal arts grads?
One thing engineering absolutely does is teach students how to reason well. Now some engineers cannot communicate well, but then again that is true of many liberal arts majors as well.
^Of course it’s not limited to liberal arts grads, and obviously you wouldn’t want a poetry major with no further training writing engineering specs. but this was in a discussion of why he hires smart liberal arts grads who don’t, on day one, have the specific skills they’ll need to do the job, as opposed to someone who has been trained in a specific skill or method but who doesn’t have the broad communication and reasoning skills he sees in a lot of liberal arts grads from strong schools.
^^ agree with Sue22.
The reality is that rarely do Engineering and LA majors compete for jobs until they reach management / executive levels. As someone in finance, I can tell you that I’ve hired econ, accounting, math, engineering and other LA majors over the past few years…but all with very specific roles in mind. I would consider anyone who applied based on experience, but the bar is pretty high to change my assumptions on educational pedigree and what best fits the role.
When I was coming out of grad school, companies like Microsoft and Intel did not look for technical undergrad for their product management and marketing roles. They were just looking for technical aptitude, they hired people who majored in history, economics etc… Now for roles in engineering, product development, yes you needed a technical undergrad.
I most likely am about to pay full price tuition for my own child to attend college starting in fall of 2018. We have saved for years to be able to do so precisely for the intellectual experience. To us, that is not “nonsense” (@zinhead) but a deeply cherished value. I can see no better use for my savings, no better reason to take out a home equity loan.
“Man does not live by bread alone.” The joy of existence is found in the type of intellectual exploration enabled by the liberal arts. Civilization is built upon it. It is what separates man from beast. (Okay, a little melodramatic… but true nonetheless!)
I hope he will study whatever he is passionate about, in a wide range of subject areas, before deciding on the major he finds most stimulating. I do not care if the major is not career-related. We do not think of college as an upscale “trade school.” He will either go to a graduate school (most likely) or, should he choose a field that takes people straight out of college-- like investment banking (I doubt he will choose that-- just an example), he can go into that field from a history or poli sci or philosophy or English or classics major or whatever. I am confident that he will find a career he finds fulfilling and that will provide enough salary for a comfortable existence in the middle class or upper class. I am also confident that the thinking and writing skills he develops in college will transfer to whatever field he may choose… and other fields he may move into in the future, jobs that may not yet have been invented today.
With both his major choice and his career choice, as well as his choice of spouse/ residence/ etc., what I most wish for him is happiness and fulfillment. I do not measure success by the size of a bank account.
^ I mean, sure, that’s a nice ideal. A luxury that is afforded to your kid only if you have a certain SES status. A kid or family from an SES, background, and culture where contributing to the support of the family is required or who’s ancestors were refugees who fled with little more than what they could carry may find your line of thinking to be just a little out of touch with the reality they know.
^^many of these elite LACs are heavy on meeting full financial need. Pomona I think was just rated as tops in this regard
@TheGreyKing #181 is an excellent post!
For sure. I’m just saying that to some people, this disdain for vocational training and all things monetary may come across as out of touch or even insulting. There are many communities where the parents are proud when they have a kid enter a vocation or making good money. Why? Because they themselves hadn’t, and they know how hard it is to reach that level if one wasn’t born in to it.
Each student may have different goals for him/herself and his/her education. And yes, I agree that one’s personal and familial history shapes those goals.
There is nothing wrong with wanting to make enough money to keep the wolf from the door, or even with valuing making money even if you are not starting from poverty. I am sorry if I came across as disdainful of that. I am not.
But I get upset when I hear talk of connecting a college’s federal funds, or even its rankings, solely to the salaries of graduates, and when people devalue certain majors or courses of study or careers as not “practical” enough. The world may need businessmen, but it also needs poets, artists, and experts in Plato.
And even if your goal is not to be a poet or artist or philosopher, but rather an investment banker or consultant or doctor or engineer, you can benefit from the study of poetry, art and philosophy in college. Education will help you to meet a goal but should also be a goal in and of itself. Education helps you to make a living, but it also helps you to make a life.
@PurpleTitan wrote
Let’s not get all David Brook-ish about this. The kids at City College in the 1930s would certainly have understood @TheGreyKing’s line of thinking. A lot of First Gen kids come from homes where education is important and where even music and the arts are valued highly. Lack of money doesn’t necessarily mean culturally backward. Not in today’s world.
I’ve been on this site for only a short time. Got overwhelmed by the super-motivated over-achiever students and, frankly, have been getting freaked out just a bit over my “normal” son and his chances. It’s unbalanced me enough that the last couple days I’ve actually been rethinking everything about our choice of schools. I’ve been re-evaluating towards “value” based on cost, etc. and thinking instead of the expensive private schools we “want” maybe he should go instead to a CSU or undesirable (to us based on location) UC. And that’s just to save money, which isn’t a primary factor for us (though my wife immigrated here from Nicaragua w/ just the shirt on her back and I grew up dirt poor.)
I want to thank you @TheGreyKing for putting it out there like you did. You expressed exactly what it is to our family for our children to go to school. Now I feel better in our decision to just pick the right school for my son regardless of these other issues. :-bd
@circuitrider: “A lot of First Gen kids come from homes where education is important and where even music and the arts are valued highly.”
Sure. Yet few of them (their families, anyway) don’t value earning power and marketable skills.
But that excludes neither LAC nor STEM education, right? If you learn to think you also learn to succeed, most likely.