<p>Engineering programs are hard. While there may be a small minority of liberal arts students who are able to handle an engineering curriculum, the majority of them would fall over in tears at the sight of a differential equation or a programming problem. </p>
<p>So yes, I think vocational and pre-professional programs are important, especially in STEM fields, but they are not easy, and probably unreachable goals for many individuals. </p>
<p>Vocational and pre-professional programs teach skills. Liberal arts programs, for the most part, do not. If you are not attending an elite school, it would be much better for you to pursue a more practical major, in order to give yourself some semblance of competitive advantage. </p>
<p>Everyone can study liberal arts and “excel at it” because the grading is liberal. The same cannot be said for STEM programs. It’s highly doubtful whether Ivy League students receive a much better education than the rest of the crowd. It is quite certain that they receive much more prestige than the rest of the crowd. </p>
<p>The liberal arts will fade, until the market assumes equilibrium, and there will be far less professors, graduate students, and undergraduate students in the liberal arts. The market is already signaling for students to leave this path, and that is a good thing. What is not a good thing is people giving bad advice and telling kids to ignore market signals and take on mountains of debt chasing fools gold.</p>
<p>“Everyone can study liberal arts and “excel at it” because the grading is liberal. The same cannot be said for STEM programs. It’s highly doubtful whether Ivy League students receive a much better education than the rest of the crowd. It is quite certain that they receive much more prestige than the rest of the crowd.”</p>
<p>Ivy students probably do get a better liberal arts education than the rest of the crowd–on average; I still think it’s poorly put together in many cases, and can vary in quality from school to school. The problem is too much politics involved with the process, and very little coherence in a genuinely rigorous liberal arts curriculum, which should ideally include macro/micro econ, stats, a course on lab/control study methods, history survey + methods/techniques in arts etc. That would be minimal. Very few places have anything comparable because of the big egos in the faculty. </p>
<p>The ideal of the liberal arts is a very good one, but not the way it’s currently put together. For a lot of schools, it’s simply much cheaper to educate an English major than it is to train an engineer. The liberal arts as a collection of disciplines won’t fade or disappear; I think we can be more precise. It’s the number of cash cow degrees will disappear from a number of colleges, and for that matter, I’d like to see some colleges/universities disappear completely. Serious students of anthropology and theoretical physics will still study their respective disciplines. </p>
<p>If you WANT to study something seriously, you’ll take the most intellectually challenging courses in your discipline. For me, I’m not worried about those students. I’m worried about the students who get a poly sci or English degree because they don’t know what else to do. Those kids will saturate the law schools and continue the troubling cycle.</p>
<p>@navy, i understand your point about the kids-wanting-to-be-athletes thing, but wouldn’t that apply to engineers as well. Sure, a more practical major may higher your chances of landing a job out of school, but if we were to get rid of liberal arts (at state schools) then the number of students studying practical majors would rise. And then would there be enough jobs for all the new kids with practical degrees?</p>
<p>I just think it’s about balance. Plus, life isn’t linear. There are plenty of paths to get to where ever one wants to be if he/she has the ambition and drive. But that’s getting into philosophy…</p>
<p>I don’t quite understand your contention that it would apply to engineers as well. </p>
<p>The engineering drop-out rate is high, where do all these would-be engineers go? Most likely, the liberal arts or business (I don’t think most business degrees are practical). </p>
<p>I am not proposing getting rid of the liberal arts at state schools. I am only proposing that the grading standards be raised sufficiently high enough so that non-serious students will be weeded out, just like in engineering. If we got rid of easy liberal arts, the bad students would drop out, and I think that’s good thing. </p>
<p>Yes, it is about balance, but it also about reason. A lot of people in the US treat education as an area of life that is immune from the constraints of reason. And I think that’s sad. No, as much ambition and drive as I can muster will not make me an NBA player. Boohoo. </p>
<p>@Windcloud</p>
<p>I’m somewhat worried about the serious students. Serious students go to graduate school. However, there’s a shocking oversupply of humanities Ph.Ds.</p>
<p>“Probably it is true that the great majority are rarely capable of thinking independently, that on most questions they accept views which they find ready-made, and that they will be equally content if born or coaxed into one set of beliefs or another. In any society freedom of thought will probably be of direct significance only for a small minority. But this does not mean anyone is competent, or ought to have power, to select those to who this freedom is to be reserved. It certainly does not justify the presumption of any group of people to claim the right to determine what people ought to think or believe. It shows a complete confusion of thought to suggest that, because under any sort of system the majority of people follow the lead of somebody, it makes no difference if everybody has to follow the same lead. To deprecate the value of intellectual freedom because it will never mean for everybody the same possibility of independent thought is completely to miss the reasons which give intellectual freedom its value. What is essential to make it serve its function as the prime mover of intellectual progress is not that everybody may be able to think or write anything but that any cause or idea may be argued by somebody. So long as dissent is not suppressed, there will always be some who will query the ideas ruling their contemporaries and put new ideas to the test the argument and propaganda.”</p>
<p>^Good quote, though I’m not sure how well it applies to the Death of Liberal Arts. I believe truly independent thought is probably just as rare in any other major. Also, other majors certainly don’t restrict independent thought…</p>
<p>^ I think the quote applies precisely to this thread, and makes its point very well: that the liberal arts encourage independent thought. This thread is replete with techie commentary variously that the liberal arts are worthless or should be reserved to Ivy Leaguers since any “lesser” liberal arts grads will be unemployable as either not bright enough or not connected enough to survive an “inferior” education.</p>
<p>Technical majors don’t prohibit independent thought, but they do not value humanities inquiries and the narrowness of the views of many techie posters on this thread demonstrate that. Can a techie read the Great Books? Sure. Do they generally care to? My experience is no and that techies often end up caring only about the politics of financial self-interest. Hmmm, what is the larger societal value that results from this twist on an “educated populace”?</p>
<p>Lots of techies out there end up as line workers/managers reporting up the chain to liberal arts majors folks (not to mention the equally declared worthless business majors) :). And lots of those upper managers don’t have an Ivy diplomas :). That’s not meant to declare war, just to point out the FACT that the techie view of “employability” is overly narrow.</p>
<p>It is true in any field that it takes motivation and drive to be successful, but that does not lessen the inherent value of a liberal arts education. I do not know how someone can truly view themselves as educated without a fundamental grounding in the humanities, yet many techie posters on this thread are disdainful of precisely that marker of the well-educated. Here’s a test: how many universities are of great reputation without strong liberal arts offerings? The answer is few and there is a reason for that.</p>
<p>Circling back, it is simply false that the land grants did not include liberal arts until post WWII. Berkeley, Wisconsin, Cornell (horrors, an Ivy is a land grant???) and MIT (also a land grant) as only a few examples.</p>
<p>Why so much bitterness cluelessdad? Your animosity towards people in technical fields is very obvious. I don’t think any of the people on here with technical backgrounds are implying that liberal arts is worthless but need I say again that facts are facts. Your statement about techies only caring about politics of financial self-interest is short cited and not true what so ever. You are coming across as jealous of people with technical degrees. Just because someone makes a lot of money doesn’t mean they are only interested in money. Many techies actually enjoy their job. Give it up already with this “many engineers will report to liberal arts gradtuates”. This is simply not true or at least very unlikely. I’m guessing you have no engineering background or work experience in the engineering field so I don’t know why you are making these claims. If you want to manage engineers, chances are that a degree in Latin, or art history, or English will not suffice. I know this because I am an engineer and I know many engineers and managers and this simply does not happen in industry.</p>
<p>Here are a few facts.
1.) In general, liberal arts degrees are much less rigorous than engineering/science degrees. I know many liberal arts graduates that totally agree with this.
2.) Statistically, engineers and science majors command higher salaries throughout their careers and are in higher demand than liberal arts graduates. This is due in part to the rigorous reqirements and difficulty of the degree.
3.) Job placement for engineers upon graduation is unmatched by practically any other major. People with technical degrees are sought after by companies upon graduation.
4.) Engineers can be found in all industries and at all levels of management. Engineers can work in business but business and liberal arts majors can’t work in engineering.</p>
<p>The objective here is not to make liberal arts graduates feel inferior but to point out facts for people who are trying to get factual information from this thread. There is no denying that a technical degree is more marketable and a better investment financially than a liberal arts degree. This is fact. Just because this is the case, it doesn’t mean that everyone should abandon liberal arts. If someone really wants to pursue liberal arts then more power to them. I do not look down on liberal arts majors at all and I have absolutely nothing against people with non-technical backgrounds. There needs to be balance in the world.</p>
<p>You think the techie view of employability is overly narrow. I think the liberal arts view of employability is many times overly naive and unrealistic.</p>
<p>It is not bitterness or jealousy (ad hominem attack excused) to point out the fallacies of the numerous posts here declaring liberal arts educations worthless/unemployable. Despite the denials, anyone who cares to review the thread will find numerous posts doing exactly that. </p>
<p>It is, however, rude and ignorant to declare other fields of study irrelevant and I make no apologies for responding to such attacks and bringing balance to the thread.</p>
<p>The point of the matter is that we believe that their is significant value in Liberal Arts continuing to coexist, despite the financial ramifications of such an endeavor, because the tendency towards calling Liberal Arts worthless only further permeates the dissolution of Universities as facilities of education for a more fiscally intuitive entrance into the world.</p>
<p>The arguments can tirelessly be made that Liberal Arts is the subject of choice for individuals who are not concerned with their college education, or just not qualified to ever become something of significance in their respective field. Yet, these arguments hold no real weight even if it is stressed that such decisions are putting a strain on the economy, because can you really argue that our biggest problem is students trying to obtain an education, and not the countless other areas were we have seen negligence from a more federal level?</p>
<p>All that is really upsetting us is that their is continued illogical justification, in this thread, for the end of liberal arts because it is viewed as worthless. When we feel that the sanctity of intellectual freedom and value should be withheld to provide anyone who chooses to do as they please with their education a freedom from intolerance.</p>
<p>I’m not sure what that data set proves to you; I suppose it comes down to perspective in interpretation. And those confounding business majors, how dare they succeed with those meaningless degrees!</p>
<p>But back to the death of the liberal arts: 8-9% of Fortune 500 CEOs (and weighted to the top end of the 500) are liberal arts grads yet the degree is worthless? (This must just be a statistical outlier, to be explained away like the confounding business majors.) Why can’t we accept that there are different aptitudes and talents, each bringing their own merits to the picture?</p>
<p>^ Do you see the connection between my post and your quoted comment regarding liberal arts in management?</p>
<p>Anyway, I do not agree with those who want to restrict access to liberal arts majors at lower schools. Such a plan has a disturbingly shortsighted and judgmental tone. However, I do support the idea of meaningful accreditation for liberal arts (not to mention business) majors. I think the critical thinking skills taught in liberal arts majors would be far more valued in the job market at all levels of prestige if there were more backbone to the required courses.</p>