<p>This link goes to pbs.org and a piece that was on TV Monday night regarding the current job market for liberal arts degree holders who came into the market at the beginning of the Great Recession. For me, a parent with a D applying to 9 colleges, it makes me even more nervous and glad that D has already been accepted into Northeastern U with its co-op program that seems to really prepare students for the working world! </p>
<p>Having graduated from an LAC right at the start of the Great Recession (I like that this is its official name now), I can definitely sympathize with this report. I went to a top college that emphasizes internships and career preparation, many of my fellow grads and I graduated with high hopes. I got lucky and got the job of my dreams (of course, I got the usual working person’s wake up call that even your “dream job” is not that dreamy some of the time. A job is still a job, it has its unpleasant parts). But a lot of my friends struggled and are now working jobs either not related to their hoped for field or much less than what they had envisioned (retail, temping, doing whatever is available to pay the student loans) . Some are still trying to intern, some have already headed back to school at least part time in hopes that with an advanced degree and some working experience, when the economy gets better they will have an edge. </p>
<p>I think one of the things to keep in mind with a Liberal Arts Degree, graduating into a very tough economy is that you need to be really really flexible, and understand that survivng the Recession requires you to be a marathon runner, not a sprinter. My friends who are working jobs that are not what they had hoped are all grateful to have jobs, and the nice thing about being young and new to the job market is that there are a lot of low-leve niches to fill. You try to get what you want of course, but you start with what you can get. Then, you don’t give up but you keep working towards your ultimate goals. </p>
<p>That means you keep networking, keep checking out night school, volunteering part time, interning part time, whatever works with your schedule. You never know when the next big thing is going to come along, and in the meantime, do what pays the bills. </p>
<p>Getting an engineering or a nursing degree might garauntee a job right out of college, getting a liberal arts degree certainly doesn’t. But getting a liberal arts degree can give you the flexibility to be available to a wide array job options rather than being set on one particular field. And while it is a struggle sometimes, I don’t know anyone who regrets having gotten the degree they got.</p>
<p>One daughter has gotten lucky (so far), but I have always supported co-op programs at universities (both the summer periods and alternating with traditional year academics). I also think that campus career services should begin much earlier. I think that students should be urgently invited to career sessions with a 1:1 advisor every semester or trimester of college. What’s valuable about that is the evolution of the student’s academic program simultaneous with the broadening of other interests and the maturing of the personality. It provides ongoing matter for self-reflection and mentor guidance by the time the student graduates – and that is a better path toward building a well-expressed resume, not to mention considering many employment paths and future options.</p>
<p>I am an unbashed supporter of the classical Liberal Arts education. When the Job Announcment doesn’t require a technical degree or experience, I’m always nudging the HR office to send us at least one or two resumes from Liberal Arts majors. LA folks are supposed to know how to think on their feet, not just regurgitate or blindly follow what’s been done before.</p>
<p>So, what you’re implying is that nurses don’t have to think on their feet, that mathematicians regurgitate equations, that engineers don’t know how to solve new problems, and that physicists blindly follow what’s been discovered by those with a classical liberal arts education?</p>
<p>This is well said. Young people (and parents too) have lots of fun making fun of liberal arts grads. However, a broad skill set is exactly what some employers are looking for. What liberal arts grads offer aren’t necessarily skills that nurses or mathematicians lack, but they do have marketable skills.</p>
<p>And I can tell you that in this home, the liberal arts major has it all over the engineer and mathematician in the people skills department.</p>
<p>I always thought that you were a parent, Smithieandproud!</p>
<p>Thanks for the link. I look forward to checking this out. The importance of linking your academic experience to job/career/internship opportunities (regardless of your type of education) is paramount, especially in this economic climate. I am heartened that many students see the wisdom of meeting people in a variety of fields, optimizing their career service contacts at school and putting themselves out there as an intern, employee or volunteer. You not only gain work experience, but also mentors, references, and a clearer idea of where you fit. If grad school is in your future, it helps narrow your focus to have these experiences. Most colleges do support and/or offer credit for internships, but you have seek this out in a non- coop environment. I wonder if the program addressed if/how this economy was impacting liberal art college apps. I do have empathy for those who pursue a degree that is not a linear path to one particular, high demand career.
Just read an interesting article in a recent issue of The Economist about USA PhD candidates, but that is another topic entirely. It is a good look at the opportunities of certain PhDs vs. master’s degrees. Recommended for students considering all aspects of that situation.</p>
<p>A smart person is a smart person, and smart people know how to analyze, draw conclusions, find information, learn it, and be innovative. I think the specific major the individual pursued is secondary. The issue is that many people wrongly perceive liberal arts graduates as not possessing marketable skills. That perception is what concerns me.</p>
<p>When tests are administered to job candidates as part of the interview process, I think this can help a liberal arts major. While these tests are scary and nerve-wracking for the applicant, it is a chance to prove that you can think well. My high school daughter landed a great summer internship along with new college grads because she was able to perform the necessary tasks in the test equally well or better. Similarly, even though my son does have an economics degree, his performance in this type of testing landed him his job over candidates with additional degrees and training (CPA license, master’s in accounting, etc.)</p>
<p>Q: How can you tell an introverted engineer from an extroverted one?
A: The introvert stares at his feet when he talks to you. The extrovert stares at yours.</p>
<p>I believe that “social skills” and quantiative/analytical ability are both somewhat innate characteristics that are negatively correlated with each other. I’ve known some exceptional people with both, and they tend to do well.
</p>
<p>Honest question: </p>
<p>Do you feel that the liberal arts education provides or fosters these marketable skills or are they innate to the individual? If TheGFG’s kids did better on their employment exam tasks than those with more education, it seems that their marketable skills may have more to do with their innate intelligence than their education.</p>
<p>Some measure of what we’d label “skill” is really just innate intelligence plus the brain training an education provides. Does a liberal arts education train a brain better than a technical or math/science education? Most of us would agree that the training is different, and also that we need both types of trained individuals. As I stated above, though, my concern is that the popular wisdom seems to be leaning toward the belief that the technical/math/science person is almost always better-trained and more employable. If that belief is indeed valid, then I’d contend the problem is not with a liberal arts education per se, or even with factors related to market forces/job availability, but rather with the QUALITY of the liberal arts education our universities are currently providing. </p>
<p>It is clear to me that on the middle school and high school level, our English curriculum is seriously lacking in training in rhetoric and analysis. There is way too much touchy-feely nonsense, too much expressing one’s feelings and opinions about a topic or a work of literature. Similarly, in social studies and history, the same “creative” assignments have crept into the curriculum such that the student becomes a pro at writing stories and poems, and creating artsy projects about topics yet can’t adequately comprehend difficult texts or analyze non-fiction writing. Yet the latter is what is needed in the workplace.</p>
<p>In addition to what’s already been said, I think some liberal-arts majors attract students who seem almost afraid to imagine their future. I’ve taught humanities at three elite universities. I ALWAYS try to get my major advisees to think about what they might want to do after they graduate–and if the answer isn’t “go immediately to graduate, law, or medical school,” then they need to start thinking early about how to make themselves attractive to employers. Sometimes they should do a double major or a minor, sometimes an internship, sometimes summer or part-time employment that will build skills and show them what they like and don’t like about various kinds of job formats. I also encourage them to visit the Career Center early in their college career, not a couple of weeks before graduation. But some students, despite good advice, seem determined to keep their heads in the sand. This subset of kids is not going to thrive on the job market, at least initially, but the problem is more a developmental one than a skills-set or training one.</p>
<p>I interpretted the comment about LA folks who “know how to think on their feet, not just regurgitate or blindly follow what’s been done before” as the first in the usualy volley of sour-grape slurs against the “vocational” majors that usually comes up in these conversations.</p>
<p>“LA folks are supposed to know how to think on their feet, not just regurgitate or blindly follow what’s been done before.”</p>
<p>hate to see dad apologize, as the connection he made seemed right on to me. as for lake, i think you suffer from a slight case of passive-aggression. who is it exactly you refer to as those who simply regurgitate what has been done before? previously you’ve lumped LA grads into a cute group of folks who can think on their feet (walk on water maybe?). meanwhile the poor misguided kids who graduate with some kind of technical capability can only…do what, then, in your opinion? or is it that you just don’t know what it is exactly they can do because your own education focused on literature, history, anthropology of…say, now that i think of it, a lot of that stuff has been done before! if you’re going to generalize, get ready to be generalized in return.</p>