<p>I don't see where the study of engineering, or any major for that matter, somehow prevents one from experiencing what Abbott is talking about. What prevents it is a hard to describe campus culture and careerist mindset that minimizes broad education and focuses either on the on the job or simply the next objective "on the way up." It is not simply a matter of taking a Core or being in this or that course; students can be in the same courses and have widely differing experiences. It is about the culture: the expectations (and practices) of the school, faculty, peers, and ultimately society of what being educated is and its value. </p>
<p>I would always tell my kids that they knew "education" was happening when they looked at a flower, a sunset, an catch in the outfield... and had thoughts about it in ways they never had before and found themselves as intrigued by those thoughts (questions, observations, etc.) as they were about what the object that occasioned them in the first place. The more this happened at plays, movies, walks in the forrest, concerts, science museums, sporting events, etc. the broader their education was becoming. The purpose of school was to have thoughts about the world around them that they would not, or could not, have without going to school, or more precisely being educated. I think this is what Abbott is talking about and to what other posters have alluded in advocating a liberal education. I have no trouble envisioning an engineer or anyone else doing this. </p>
<p>Training is for graduate or professional school. For my kids, the blessed four years of undergraduate life I want to be about education.</p>