<p>Ivy Grad wrote, "Cheney flunked out of Yale and then went onto study (<em>engineers gasp in unison</em>) political science at the University of Wyoming."</p>
<p>I knew about Wyoming, but didn't know, or had forgotten ... it happens at my age ... about his Yale episode.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Well, nice summary dissertation on nepostism. Nobody's denying that. I certainly wasn't. That's life. BUT, that's NOT even the point.</p>
<p>What is? MY POINT was only that I found it extremely ironic that the three cited examples that you gave were extremely poor ones given that those three individuals have acheived so much -- have had extraordinary careers above and beyond 99.9% of people who visit this website can hope to achieve.</p>
<p>In other words, you start to talk about "mediocre" "lazy" "underachieving" liberal arts college students - THEN - you point to Bush, Gore and Kerry - who, in fact, have had extraordinary lives and have accomplished above and beyond any geeky engineer in their class.</p>
<p>Basically, your examples totally undermine your whole point.</p>
<p>It's called IRONY dude.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Again, I'm afraid I must disagree. It's more complicated than you are implying.</p>
<p>First off - who seriously denies that those 3 guys were mediocre college students? All of them have admitted that they weren't exactly the most responsible students. </p>
<p>So you might say that their success undermines my point about hard work. I don't think it does, because my central point is not about who is going to enjoy more future success, but merely about who works harder on average - the engineer or the liberal arts student? I think nobody seriously disputes that, on average, it is the engineer. </p>
<p>What you're trying to say is that hard work doesn't always pay off. But that was never my point. The fact is, Bush, Kerry, and Gore got to where they are because of nepotism. I think we all know that if they hadn't been born in the families that they were born in, they would never have achieved the heights they reached. You attempt to credit their success to their soft skills, conveniently omitting the fact that there are lots of people with superior soft skills who never become President or Vice President or Senator. The fact is, if nepotism didn't exist, they would never have achieved what they achieved. Hence what their examples really do is reinforce one of my subpoints, which is that some liberal arts students don't study hard because they know they don't have to. </p>
<p>If you don't agree - then fine. Answer this question. How do the examples of Bush, Kerry, and Gore undermine my central point that engineering students tend to study harder than liberal arts students? I think they actually strengthen my point (which is why I brought them up) not undermine it.</p>
<p>I think this whole engineering v. liberal arts debate is actually pretty similar to the elite college v. lower-tier state school debate. The smartest people at a state school are just as smart as their Ivy/Ivy-equivalent peers, but the average state schooler never had a prayer of being admitted to an elite university/LAC. Similarily, the average liberal arts student is probably less motivated than the average engineering student, because engineering by its very nature is a more difficult and more work-intensive degree. Therefore it attracts a brighter set of students, which make up a small subset of the total population (just like students attending top universities are a small subset of all college students- though you're in danger of forgetting that if you spend too much time on CC! ;) ). </p>
<p>Note: Please remember that when I say "average student," I am talking about average average, not goes-to-a-top-25-school average.</p>
<p>And before I get flamed, let me just say that I am speaking against my own vested interest here. I loathe math and science and would never even dream of going into engineering. My plan is to be an economics/sociology double major, and to do independent research in one of those subjects so that I can pursue a PhD in either finance or management. I expect to work just as hard as even the most driven engineering students, but I also understand that my situation is not the norm.</p>
<p>As far as working in a big city law firm, elite school degrees dont work. As a law clerk, I've seen the hiring process. My employer is also on the professionalism of the state bar and actually interviews bar applicants. And ive transcribed a few interviews for hirees of the firm. Most of our lawyers graduated from University of Baltimore Law and grad from liberal arts colleges and we have clients ranging from the Baltimore Ravens to super big class action lawsuits that reap millions. I think after you land your first job, your elite degree doesnt matter.</p>
<p>As far as grad schools go, a liberal arts, state, political science A average major is worth the same as a B average Brown nuclear engineering major.</p>
<p>But I dont hate on the degrees, to each his own. If you want to spend the extra money- its your choice.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I loathe math... I can pursue a PhD in... finance...
[quote]
</p>
<p>Uh, am I the only one that sees something wrong with this picture? I hope not to burst your bubble, but advanced finance, especially at the doctoral level, is all math. If you loathe math, believe me, you don't want to go anywhere near a doctoral program in finance.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Uh, am I the only one that sees something wrong with this picture? I hope not to burst your bubble, but advanced finance, especially at the doctoral level, is all math. If you loathe math, believe me, you don't want to go anywhere near a doctoral program in finance.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>now here's something we can agree on 100%.</p>
<p>advanced corporate finance is essentially PURE math...</p>
<p>for example, check out "black scholes" option pricing theory, where most option pricing discussions begin:</p>
<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black-Scholes%5B/url%5D">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black-Scholes</a></p>
<p><em>shrugs</em> I hated math from about 3rd-10th grade, but ending up liking calculus (BC and multivar). I'm going to take all the recommended pre-finance math courses (diff eq, probability, lin. alg). If I continue the trend of liking math again then I'd consider going for the finance degree. If want to shoot myself after taking those classes, well then I obviously wouldn't go for the finance PhD but would keep the econ major anyways (it would serve me better than sociology if I decided I don't want a PhD, which is very possible - I've lost track of how many times I've changed career goals so far. :p)</p>
<p>I agree with Banana about liberal arts majors vs. energineering majors. It's also important to remember that difficulty is relative. For some outstanding math students (i.e., the types of people who would want to be engineers), English and history classes have been a struggle. For these students, liberal arts fields are a difficult chore, and math is fun and easy. Therefore, engineering truly isn't too much work, whereas tons and tons of English may have been.</p>
<p>You are so right, Semiserious. You said exactly what I wanted to say. Very few of the brilliant engineers that my husband works with can write a decent paragraph. That is why there are plenty of other people in the organization to handle the PR and human resources type work. It takes all kinds of smart people to run a successful operation!</p>
<p>
[quote]
Very few of the brilliant engineers that my husband works with can write a decent paragraph.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I think that's where a kind of elitism can come in. I'm only talking from my personal experience, but quite a few of the engineering majors I know blew off English class because they felt it was beneath them. I know this doesn't apply to all engineers, or even a majority of them, but I think things like that do contribute to how defensive liberal arts majors can be when they're being compared to their peers in engineering.</p>
<p>You're probably right about the elitism mattering there, Banana. Most of these engineers, though VERY adept at what they do, did not graduate from the "elite" schools. They probably struggled greatly with English classes.</p>
<p>You're probably right, but what I was talking about was not struggling so much as it was an "I'm going to be an engineer, this isn't important" attitude towards the humanities.</p>
<p>That's so true, too. As a matter of fact, the best state engineering school we have does not even make the students in engineering take very many of the humanities courses. For example, they automatically exempt foreign language requirements and take minimal English courses. That's another contributor to engineers who cannot communicate well.</p>
<p>The conversation has progressed to a point that suggests I should repost something I wrote earlier in the thread.</p>
<p>A number of years ago, MIT began feeding more liberal arts back into its undergraduate core curriculum. When asked why, MIT's president said, "Because we're tired of having our most talented graduates end up working for guys from up the river." He referred, of course, to Harvard, just up the Charles.</p>
<p>Recent posts suggest that too many engineering students disdain acquiring the very skills they will need if they are ever to be anything but hired hands for more broadly educated individuals.</p>
<p>Also, the conversation keeps drifting away from the original question behind the thread, "How important is an Elite College Degree?"</p>
<p>This thread is about ELITE schools. Yet Sakky and others keep bringing in hollow liberal arts degrees from mediocre schools to prove the superiority of engineering over other academic disciplines ... and of engineering students over students in other disciplines, whatever the school. </p>
<p>Let's remember that anyone admitted to the elite schools about which this thread was initiated worked damned hard in high school or is hyper-bright. Probably both. At Harvard, humanities majors most likely had math SATs north of 700 (a few years ago the 25th-75th percentile range was 700-790).</p>
<p>I'm sure Sakky is right that a senior thesis is not necessarily required to graduate from an elite liberal arts program, but it surely is required to graduate with honors from such a program (they are often called "honors theses"). That's important because grade inflation has made a degree with honors the base currency at too many schools. Employers and grad schools admissions officers know this. Hence the value of the thesis as a window into the applicant's mind. JFK had mediocre grades at Harvard, but his thesis, "Why England Slept," showed the quality of his mind.</p>
<p>As to Sakky's concern that many people don't want to attend grad school, perhaps he's right. However, the vast majority of graduates from elite colleges go on to grad school within a few years, if not immediately. That's because they know that a graduate degree now occupies the place in the competition for the best jobs and career tracks that a bachelors degree held forty or fifty years ago. Sad but true. And a bachelors degree today is roughly analogous to a high school diploma in those days. Maybe not even that ... fifteen or so years ago they had to dumb down the verbal side of the SATs because the average scores were getting so low compared to the historical standard.</p>
<p>
[quote]
A number of years ago, MIT began feeding more liberal arts back into its undergraduate core curriculum. When asked why, MIT's president said, "Because we're tired of having our most talented graduates end up working for guys from up the river." He referred, of course, to Harvard, just up the Charles.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>It wasn't the MIT President who said that. It was Margaret MacVicar, former dean of undergraduate education.</p>
<p>"Margaret MacVicar, former dean of undergraduate education, famously remarked, "Too many MIT graduates are working for too many Harvard and Princeton graduates"."</p>
<p>And while it is clearly true that a lot of MIT graduates work for Harvard and Princeton graduates, I think a lot of it has to do with nepotism. The fact is, Harvard and Princeton have a long history of being bastions of upper-crust WASPS's. In those days, which were only just a generation ago, Ivy League schools like Harvard and Princeton were more social finishing schools rather than academic hothouses. Lots of Harvard and Princeton students knew full well that Daddy was going to give them a job upon graduation, and they would eventually take over Daddy's company. MIT students, on the other hand, tended to be far more proletariat and blue-collar. MIT tended to be a school you went to because you knew you didn't have a rich family that was going to hand you success on a silver platter, so you would have to find success yourself. If success meant that you had to work for a Harvard graduate who had just been handed the reins to Daddy's company, well, so be it. </p>
<p>Now obviously that's a generalization, for there are indeed some Harvard students, even in the old days, who bootstrapped their way in from poverty. And there are some scions of rich families who attended MIT. But the fact is, Harvard do tend to come from "Old Money" more than do MIT students. </p>
<p>
[quote]
Recent posts suggest that too many engineering students disdain acquiring the very skills they will need if they are ever to be anything but hired hands for more broadly educated individuals.</p>
<p>Also, the conversation keeps drifting away from the original question behind the thread, "How important is an Elite College Degree?"</p>
<p>This thread is about ELITE schools. Yet Sakky and others keep bringing in hollow liberal arts degrees from mediocre schools to prove the superiority of engineering over other academic disciplines ... and of engineering students over students in other disciplines, whatever the school. </p>
<p>Let's remember that anyone admitted to the elite schools about which this thread was initiated worked damned hard in high school or is hyper-bright. Probably both. At Harvard, humanities majors most likely had math SATs north of 700 (a few years ago the 25th-75th percentile range was 700-790).
[/quote]
</p>
<p>First off, let me be clear. I think it is important that engineers develop a broad set of skills. I have never disputed this point. I have always believed that many engineers do not possess a proper knowledge of the liberal arts, in many cases because they don't want to possess that knowledge, and that's a problem.</p>
<p>However, my point is that while many engineers have neither the proper knowledge of nor respect for liberal arts, the fact is, many liberal arts students also do not have a proper knowledge of nor respect for the liberal arts. Yeah, that's right, even a lot of liberal arts students don't know a lot about the liberal arts. That's because a lot of them are not really interested in studying or learning anything at all - all they want is an easy degree without having to study very much. Basically, they just want to coast their way through college. You can do that in the liberal arts, but not in engineering.</p>
<p>This applies even in the elite schools. One might say that Harvard students were highly accomplished and highly motivated while they were in high school. Sure. But the real question, how motivated are they while in college? It doesn't matter how good you were in high school - what matters in college is how good you were in college. I think we've all seen people who, as college students, completely lost all motivation to study. They figure that their parents aren't around to check up on them, and they can take a bunch of easy classes where they will pass without having to do much, so they figure they can just lollygag around. </p>
<p>Again, take a gander at Bush, Kerry, and Gore. Let's face it. When they were in college, they were bad students. I think all 3 of them basically admitted that they lazily sleptwalked their way through a Harvard or Yale liberal arts degree. Both Bush and Gore have admitted that they were more interested in partying and hanging out than in studying. Kerry admitted that he was more interested in learning how to fly planes than he was in his Yale liberal arts courses, and, from his quote "''I always told my Dad that D stood for distinction". I'm sure things are even worse today because of present-day grade inflation. At least when Bush, Gore, and Kerry lazily slacked off at Harvard and Yale, they got punished with mediocre grades for their effort. Today, you can be lazy at Harvard or Yale and STILL get good grades, or at least, better grades than what those 3 guys got. </p>
<p>So, again, I would maintain that I know a lot of engineers who I would argue have learned more about the liberal arts (through extra reading as a hobby after work) than Bush, Gore, or Kerry learned about the liberal arts while they were in college. Note, that's not a political statement because I'm sure that Bush, Gore and Kerry learned a lot about the liberal arts after college, but I'm talking about what they learned while they were in college. All 3 of them have themselves conceded that none of them were particularly motivated college students. </p>
<p>Or to give you another example, and not to brag, but I would say that while I don't have a degree in any liberal arts, I would like to think that I know more about the liberal arts than a guy majoring in a liberal art but who is coasting his way through, even if that guy is an Ivy League student. Now clearly, those guys who studied hard would know far more than me. But I'm arguing that I would know more than the lazy guys. That's not because I think I have learned a lot about the liberal arts, because I haven't, but more because those lazy Ivy-League guys have learned even less. And the sad fact is, you really can graduate with a liberal arts degree, even from an Ivy-League school, without having learned very much or studied very hard. You won't graduate at the top of your class, but you will graduate. Again, take a look at Bush, Gore, and Kerry. Given their transcripts and their own admission about their lack of motivation to study, how much do you think they really learned as college students? Be honest.</p>
<p>
[quote]
JFK had mediocre grades at Harvard, but his thesis, "Why England Slept," showed the quality of his mind
[/quote]
</p>
<p>There seems to be quite a controversy about just how strong that book/thesis really was. It seems to me that the book's success due more to nepotism than to quality. </p>
<p>"The book was originally intended to be no more than a college thesis and is not considered to be particularly well written (was rated as a magna cum laude by Professor Henry A. Yeomans and as a cum laude plus by Professor Carl J. Friedrich). However Kennedy's father, Joseph Kennedy, always keen to elevate his sons' reputation for future political standing, pulled strings with his publishing contacts to secure its release and then purchased some 30,000 copies, which were stored, unread, in the attic of the family's home in Hyannisport."</p>
<p>
[quote]
As to Sakky's concern that many people don't want to attend grad school, perhaps he's right. However, the vast majority of graduates from elite colleges go on to grad school within a few years, if not immediately. That's because they know that a graduate degree now occupies the place in the competition for the best jobs and career tracks that a bachelors degree held forty or fifty years ago. Sad but true.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Well, what I should have said is not that a lot of liberal arts students don't care at all about going to grad-school, but rather that a lot don't care enough about it to study extremely hard. And one big reason for that is something you mentioned before - the grade inflation. A lot of liberal arts students quickly realize that even if they don't study hard, they'll still get grades that are probably good enough to get into graduate school. Why work hard when you don't have to? As you said yourself, grade inflation muddies the water and makes it difficult to distinguish between the hardworking students and the lazy ones. </p>
<p>Now let me be clear. I have always agreed with the general point that engineers ought to know more about the liberal arts. However, my point is that a lot of liberal arts students also ought to know more about the liberal arts, and as a lemma, you really can graduate with a liberal arts degree from a top-school without actually knowing a lot about the liberal arts. That's because, sadly, a lot of liberal arts classes have inflated grades and low minimum standards such that a lot of people pass classes (and often times with pretty good grades) who hardly bothered to learn anything. There is nothing that makes engineering inherently superior to the liberal arts, I never said there was. But the major difference is how accomodating they are to the lazier, unmotivated students.</p>
<p>Sakky wrote, "And while it is clearly true that a lot of MIT graduates work for Harvard and Princeton graduates, I think a lot of it has to do with nepotism. The fact is, Harvard and Princeton have a long history of being bastions of upper-crust WASPS's. In those days, which were only just a generation ago, Ivy League schools like Harvard and Princeton were more social finishing schools rather than academic hothouses."</p>
<p>Now who is indulging in stereotypes? I went to one of the hyper-elite colleges being discussed, and my family didn't have a pot to **** in. None of my five suite mates came from a background more affluent than middle class. Few of our friends came from any kind of substantial money. Sure, there were bluebloods, but they were a minority. In those years, the Harvard student body was distinctly middle class in origin. Harvard pioneered need blind admissions and need based aid. They could do it because even in the 1950s they had by far the biggest endowment. Incidentally, today, 67% of MIT students came from public high school ... the comparable number for Harvard is 65% (not to be confused with the far more elitist Princeton where only 55% attended public high school).</p>
<p>Sakky, my point about grade inflation is that top grad school admissions officers aren't stupid. They know the problem. The value of a thesis isn't the grade written on it, it is the thesis itself. A strong thesis, submitted with a grad school application, provides something tangible for admissions decision makers to grab hold of ... so that given comparable GMATs, LSATs, etc., they can make an informed choice between two students from different colleges whose undergrad GPAs may reveal little about their relative merit. </p>
<p>I know West Point grads who were admitted to Harvard Business School after their five years active duty with undergrad GPAs a whole point lower than the average for their HBS classmates. The admissions people knew the relative worth of a 2.7 at West Point and a 3.7 at, say, Harvard, which has perhaps the most scandalous grade inflation problem among elite colleges. I know of similar examples for top law schools and other graduate programs.</p>
<p>Let's agree to disagree ... you hold onto your prejudice against liberal arts majors and I'll hold onto my parochial conviction that anyone without a basic foundation in the liberal arts is not truly educated. As you may have gathered, I believe that to be a liberally educated citizen, one should have meaningful exposure to the humanities, mathematics, hard sciences, social sciences, arts, etc., ... and, yes, to basic engineering science ... before focusing on their life's work. I'm the first to say that very few so-called liberal arts colleges insist on such broad study before students focus on their major. They used to, but all that was lost in the self-indulgent student rebellion of the 1960s. The elite campuses were both more open and more rigorous intellectually in the 1950s and early 1960s, before the rise of SDS and its ilk.</p>
<p>Now let me start a real explosion. If you think liberal arts degrees are hollow, what about such bankrupt "disciplines" as undergraduate business, pre-law, and education programs?</p>
<p>
[quote]
Now who is indulging in stereotypes? I went to one of the hyper-elite colleges being discussed, and my family didn't have a pot to **** in. None of my five suite mates came from a background more affluent than middle class. Few of our friends came from any kind of substantial money. Sure, there were bluebloods, but they were a minority. In those years, the Harvard student body was distinctly middle class in origin. Harvard pioneered need blind admissions and need based aid. They could do it because even in the 1950s they had by far the biggest endowment. Incidentally, today, 67% of MIT students came from public high school ... the comparable number for Harvard is 65% (not to be confused with the far more elitist Princeton where only 55% attended public high school).
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I never said that all Ivy students came from blue-blooded quasi-royalty. But, seriously, I don't think anybody would deny the Ivy League's, and especially Harvard's, very long history of catering to upper-crust WASP's. Has the Ivy League changed in the last generation? Sure. But you cannot seriously deny that the Ivy League was basically a finishing school for WASP's for centuries. </p>
<p>Let's not forget that during those same 1950's that you cite, the highly racist Jewish quotas, as well as less stringent restrictions against African-Americans and other minorites, was very much a reality at Harvard and other Ivy League institutions. Heck, it was precisely that sort of blatant anti-Semitism that led to the founding of Brandeis University as a haven for Jews who were discrminated against by the Ivy League. Richard Feynman said in his autobiography that he wanted to go to Columbia for undergrad, but couldn't get in because of the Jewish quotas, so he ended up going to MIT instead. </p>
<p>The point is, given the Ivy League's long history of serving blue-bloods, it doesn't surprise me at all to find MIT graduates working for Harvard graduates. What that really tells me is that young scrappy go-getters often end up having to work for people who are descended from Old Money. A far more fair comparison would be to look at a bunch of MIT and Harvard guys who happen to come from the same sort of socioeconomic background and then track who ends up working for whom. It is possible that the MIT guys might still end up working for the Harvard guys, but it would be a lot more evenly matched. </p>
<p>The point I'm making is that the presence of Old Money is a very strong confounding factor in the present analysis. MIT simply doesn't have the 370 year history or the strong connection to the Boston Brahmins or the WASP East-Coast Establishment that Harvard does. That's an undeniable fact. MIT can't brag of connections with families like the Cabots, the Forbes, the Winthrops, the Lodges, the Delanos, the Lowells, the Peabodys, or the Kennedys the way that Harvard can. </p>
<p>So what do you expect from MIT? I'm surprised that MIT has actually been able to compete as well as it does in the face of all that Old Money and old history. Turn the situation around. If MIT had that kind of history and the connections to all those old families, and Harvard was the upstart, I think you would agree with me that it might be the Harvard administrators who would be the ones complaining that too many of their graduates end up working for MIT graduates.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Sakky, my point about grade inflation is that top grad school admissions officers aren't stupid. They know the problem. The value of a thesis isn't the grade written on it, it is the thesis itself. A strong thesis, submitted with a grad school application, provides something tangible for admissions decision makers to grab hold of ... so that given comparable GMATs, LSATs, etc., they can make an informed choice between two students from different colleges whose undergrad GPAs may reveal little about their relative merit.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>While I wouldn't say that grad-school adcoms are stupid in that I'm sure they know about grade inflation, the real question is whether they care. I have sadly seen many examples of people getting into top-flight graduate schools by deliberately taking easy classes in order to boost their GPA. </p>
<p>In fact, this is something that I have myself discussed in great detail on both the pre-med and pre-law sections of CC. I don't want to repeat myself here (you can go search for my old posts), but suffice it to say that MIT premeds actually need, on average, HIGHER grades to get admitted to med-school than do premeds from HYPS. That's right - HIGHER. And the fact is, most MIT students are engineers, whereas most HYPS students are not. Hence, I would venture to say that the HYPS grades earned by their premeds are significantly more inflated than the grades earned by the MIT premeds, on average. Obviously isolated exceptions exist, but I'm talking about the averages. Yet, the fact is, MIT premeds actually have to have HIGHER grades than the HYPS premeds to get admitted. That's the exact opposite of what you would expect, if the adcoms really cared to adjust for grade inflation. </p>
<p>{Incidentally, this has led many people, not just myself but many others, to independently arrive at the conclusion that MIT and Caltech are not the best places to go for premed. The fact is, the med-school adcoms apparently do not compensate applicants for going to difficult schools, or taking difficult classes. From what I can tell, if you want to get into med-school, it's better to get an easy A than to get a hard-won B. That's sadly how the game of med-school admissions works.} </p>
<p>
[quote]
Let's agree to disagree ... you hold onto your prejudice against liberal arts majors and I'll hold onto my parochial conviction that anyone without a basic foundation in the liberal arts is not truly educated. As you may have gathered, I believe that to be a liberally educated citizen, one should have meaningful exposure to the humanities, mathematics, hard sciences, social sciences, arts, etc., ... and, yes, to basic engineering science ... before focusing on their life's work.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Well, look, I have no 'prejudice' against liberal arts per se. Heck, why do I choose to read all these liberal arts books in my spare time, if I'm so prejudiced against it? </p>
<p>My 'prejudice' against the liberal arts majors, as opposed to liberal arts as a subject of study, is not tremendously dissimilar to your prejudice about it - namely, that many liberal arts majors do not have high minimum standards of achievement. You yourself have railed against the grade inflation in the liberal arts. I generalize that to a broader discussion of what minimum standards exist in the liberal arts. The fact is, you really can pick up a liberal arts degree from an elite school without studying very much or working very hard. Maybe you won't graduate at the top of your class, but you will still graduate. Which gets back to a point I made before - that while many engineering students don't know enough about liberal arts, many liberal arts students ALSO don't know enough about liberal arts. The truth is, sadly, you don't have to know very much about liberal arts in order to coast your way through and graduate with a liberal arts degree. </p>
<p>So, to distill our arguments, you advocate that engineering students learn more about liberal arts. I agree. However, I also advocate that liberal arts departments raise their standards to either force their lazy students to start studying harder, or simply expel them. You go to school to learn, not to hang out and lounge around all day long. </p>
<p>
[quote]
Now let me start a real explosion. If you think liberal arts degrees are hollow, what about such bankrupt "disciplines" as undergraduate business, pre-law, and education programs
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Again, it's not that I have anything against liberal arts per se. For example, there is no theoretical reason why, say, American Studies couldn't be just as difficult as engineering. But the way that it is run today, it isn't. The way it is, those kinds of majors tends to have students who are there just because they are looking for something easy. </p>
<p>However, now that you ask, yes, I agree that in many cases, undergrad business and education programs are just as worse, if not more so, than many liberal arts degrees. Again, it's nothing to do with the inherent discipline. These programs could be just as rigorous and demanding as an engineering program. And the elite undergrad business programs are quite demanding. However, I agree that there are many others that have few minimal standards and as a result have devolved into being known as "football player majors" or "drunk frat-boy majors", filled with athletes who are in those classes just because they want to stay eligible to play (maybe not so much in the Ivy league, but definitely at schools that have major Division-1A sports programs), or students who otherwise don't want to spend too much time studying.</p>
<p>sakky,u forget that pre-med requirements are not entirely easy. Ochem is a tough class for ANYONE</p>
<p>
[Quote]
I'm the first to say that very few so-called liberal arts colleges insist on such broad study before students focus on their major. They used to, but all that was lost in the self-indulgent student rebellion of the 1960s. The elite campuses were both more open and more rigorous intellectually in the 1950s and early 1960s, before the rise of SDS and its ilk.
[/Quote]
</p>
<p>laxdad,</p>
<p>So your response to the topic's question is that an elite degree dated before 1965 or so was important, but today ??? ;)</p>