Virtues of a liberal arts education

Parent Cafe
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the main reason for a classical education is precisely its uselessness. True learning is practically useless; and it should be. It is not about deploying knowledge to master the world, it is about the pursuit of truth for the sake of nothing else. It is about the highest things. How is a life worth living if it ignores them?

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<p>In</a> Defense Of "Classical Studies" - The Dish | By Andrew Sullivan - The Daily Beast</p>

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I have to respectfully disagree with your assertion that "the main reason for a classical education is precisely its uselessness". I majored in history, with a heavy focus in ancient and Medieval Europe, and I wish I could cop to even the content being useless, but I just can't. I draw on the lessons of history every day when interpreting current events. ... I look at today's rising inequality and I see traces of the Roman inequality that destroyed a Republic in the span of a century.</p>

<p>But the most useful part of majoring in history wasn't learning history; it was learning how to learn and how to understand things.</p>

<p>It was learning how to take a complete jumble of names, dates, places, facts, ideas, conjecture, and so on and build from it a stable, mostly-consistent picture of what really happened. It's a skill that, quite frankly, has formed the backbone of my career. Useless? Hardly. But it's the kind of learning that defies easy quantification

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<p>In</a> Defense Of "Classical Studies" Ctd - The Dish | By Andrew Sullivan - The Daily Beast</p>

<p>and further on in the same link:</p>

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I've had several positions during my working life where I have had the opportunity, or burden, of wading through resumes at either the first or second stage of the hiring process for a new position. ... Those students with a strong liberal arts background are far more likely to write a coherent sentence or paragraph. ... The ability to string together a group of ideas into a logical sequence, or to know the difference between a hypothesis and a theory (or a hypothesis and an ellipsis, for that matter), makes someone far more appealing as an employee. </p>

<p>A technical degree will help you get a job in an IT section, but if you can't express yourself and communicate abstract ideas to your co-workers or subordinates, you will be imposing a cost of low productivity that cannot be measured and could have been mitigated.

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<p>But of course the 18-year-old STEM majors who post here know better ...</p>

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<p>The fact is that “true learning” is not happenning in class room. What is happenning there is a brain wash. “True learning” is possible only thru life experiences.<br>
However, the purpose of going to college is very personal. Ctiting various opinions in regard to this is not applicable at all. Some family has unlimited resources and sends the child to top school to find a spouse. Another has a kid who dreams about being an MD or a lawyer or an engineer, liberal arts might not serve the purpose here. Could you please explain what various opinions of strangers have to do with personal goals of specific family?</p>

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<p>Knowing the successes and failures of the past, the motivating factors, the varying interpretations, gives great insight into current events and allows one to impact the present and future with more information. One has to be familiar with history, philosophy, theology, literature, art history, music, etc. to see past trends clearly and see present events in perspective. That is not to say the STEM students cannot do the same thing, so long as they attend a school with a core curriculum or are curious and self-educated.</p>

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<p>There is a place for a liberal arts education – but maybe that place should be high school.</p>

<p>I see this with my daughter. She was in an intense IB program in high school, and it shows. She can think and reason, and she can write a coherent paragraph or essay. She has substantial knowledge of a variety of liberal arts topics, including history, literature, and philosophy. She studied both music and a foreign language at a high level. She knows what a hypothesis is.</p>

<p>But in college, her focus was on completing a major that would help her get a job. And it worked.</p>

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<p>Perhaps opening the eyes of the “specific family” so that they can better counsel their impressionable junior members.</p>

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<p>Well, I’d say the “true learning” you get through “life experiences” is limited by the life you actually live. If it’s with the same old friends who tread the same old paths, adhere to the same old beliefs with nothing to challenge them- and no desire to be challenged- no diversity of thought or action, well, to me, that’s living in a box.</p>

<p>I have a group of young friends from a prestigious art school that offers a BA- so, liberal arts is a requirement. What a great, educated bunch. And, it shows in their art, because they have a knowledge base and can draw references to the greater world. Some of my favorite tech folks are driven by interests along the lines of classical studies, whether it’s history, music, lit or cultures. Never hurts to be well rounded. Unless, of course, all you want is to live in a box. To me, that wouldn’t be living.</p>

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<p>And if you define success in life as the job you get when you’re 22, then yes, you should spend your college years maximizing your short-term employability.</p>

<p>But if you’re more concerned with how rich a life you’re going to live for the next 60 years or so, perhaps the focus should be otherwise.</p>

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<p>[Liberal</a> Arts I: They Keep Chugging Along | Inside Higher Ed](<a href=“http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2010/10/01/connor]Liberal”>http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2010/10/01/connor)

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<p>Yes, and the STEM-focused schools that recognize this (think MIT) are to be commended. Unfortunately, too many STEM programs only require a bare minimum of non-STEM courses, and allow students to select the least challenging among the offerings. And the students all too often regard them as burdens to be borne rather than as opportunities to enrich their educations - and their lives.</p>

<p>(And yes, ucbalumnus, I would say the same about humanities/social science majors who regard math and the sciences as equally burdensome.)</p>

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<p>D1, a solid humanities major (depth and breadth) will be taking math 101 next semester- to fulfill some left-over requirement. Must say, since she had other opps (eg, a humanities class with a little stats thrown in,) I am proud of her. Will it be tough? Will it expand her thinking? Doubt it. But, she’s doing it. She also filled a lab sci req with a murderous science specialty class- her C was a gift. But, she entertains us with what she did learn. And, that is a delight.</p>

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<p>I think many young people are concerned primarily with the job they will get at 22 and the career that it will lead to. And I can’t blame them, especially in this economy.</p>

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Sneer as you will, those 18 year olds are simply kids nervous about the undeniably uncertain job market. Many of them have moderate to heavy amounts of student debt to boot. </p>

<p>Classics is all well and good, but in today’s job market, students wanting to major in such a field need to have a detailed plan of action, preferably long before graduation. There is a reason business/accounting/finance, nursing/health, and engineering/technology majors dominate the “majors employers want to see” surveys that seem to be so popular these days; the skills acquired in those majors are obvious and readily transferable from the classroom to a work environment. Liberal arts graduates can get jobs too – if they take appropriate steps in preparation, whether it’s acquiring computer skills on the side, picking up useful modern languages, or doing relevant internships in business or another field of interest.</p>

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<p>It seems to me the biggest problem with American Educational culture is this divide. One must either pick the Humanities and take one maybe two math classes during all of 4 years or one must pick STEM and rush through the easiest possible Humanities to meet the minimum standards. It seems to me that the Asian Educational culture insists that everyone learn everything. If an Asian student is average at spelling (just to pick on my own weakness) he would be sent to a spelling tutor. Whereas, I as an American (read white chick if you like) would be more incline to do math camp while telling myself spelling doesn’t count, I can always use spellcheck.<br>
Far too many American students get away with taking the minimum in whatever area they are weak. How exactly is that education? So if your liberal arts education includes a heavy helping of algebra and statistics based math then that is wonderful.</p>

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<p>That 18-year-old kids are focused on the short term is understandable. That adults who should know better enable them is not.</p>

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<p>I would quarrel only with the implication that one “must” do this. It is a choice. One can choose to go to an institution that enables a broad education. At many, perhaps most institutions, one can choose courses outside one’s major field that stretch the mind.</p>

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<p>I know little about Asian education culture. I have heard, however, that in at least some Asian cultures, education is largely about cramming for the purpose of doing well on standardized tests. If that is true, I would not consider that to be healthy.</p>

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<p>OP, I’m a 19 year old STEM major, and I love humanities. I hope to be able to take a summer class in Greece this summer about classics and mythology. I know there are a lot of misleading posters, but we’re not all obsessive about science being “better”, I promise!</p>

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Couldn’t agree more myself!</p>

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<p>sparkles21, congratulations! I’m certainly not against STEM majors, just those who think it’s appropriate to sneer at people who choose other majors. My DD is a high school senior at a math and science school and is seriously considering a STEM major herself; and given her wide interests thus far (she’s currently taking two languages), I’m not worried about her becoming too narrowly focused.</p>

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<p>Those who take more than the necessary number of courses in the areas in which they are weak are risking their GPAs – which are important for graduate school admissions and many jobs. Is it really worth it to take that literature course to round out your general education if writing about literature is your weakness and the resulting low grade drops your GPA below an employer’s cutoff?</p>

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<p>It’s almost an irrelevant conversation. What is it? 11% of U.S. college students study for liberal arts degrees? And that INCLUDES mathematics, chemistry, biology, physics, etc.</p>

<p>The oddity, though, is that accredited business colleges in the U.S. require MORE in the way of distributional requirements in the liberal arts than most liberal arts colleges do.</p>

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<p>Taking that literature course that is challenging for you and doing what is necessary to get a good grade will stretch and build your mind - and I would say the same thing to an English major contemplating a challenging math or science course.</p>