<p>“Should one assume that your position that a LA education is de facto void of … content knowledge?”</p>
<p>Agreed, just because a liberal arts education includes a wide range of exposure, it doesn’t mean there isn’t a focus which would allow for more depth. It’s just a different focus. Don’t STEM students also take liberal arts courses in addition to their more narrow focus on engineering or math?</p>
<p>
LOL, IP, you posted the NYT article that many of us (myself included) posted 3 months ago when it first came out. The other article about liberal arts education is over a year old. This is old news. The economy will turn around and the college grads, especially the ones with good interpersonal and critical thinking skills will be gainfully employed.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Yes, kicking and screaming about what a waste of time they are, they often do.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Said friend graduated respectably from his private university with no debt, continuously worked as a regulator to ensure insurance companies don’t rip off the public, earned a masters degree on the way, and is sharp enough to run rings around many elite college/university grads in the working world. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I second that based on my own observations in the workplace. However, this is not only an issue limited to STEM majors…but also those who feel they’re God’s gift to the world by virtue of having attended what is a perceived elite institution…whether it is MIT, Princeton, Tsinghua, National Taiwan University, etc. </p>
<p>Generally…if one lacked the social skills to realize that bragging about or even subtly telegraphing one’s supposed “superiority” because he/she attended [insert name of elite/Ivy university/college] and/or [insert “superior” major] will rub most co-workers/managers the wrong way. Especially those with similar/same educational backgrounds IME. Not too surprisingly…most of these types don’t last very long…regardless of their impressive educational credentials. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Many STEM majors I knew chose their majors not only because of their aptitude and career aspirations…but also so they could avoid “heavy”* reading and writing assignments that often come with humanities/social science courses. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard STEM major classmates/colleagues whine endlessly about writing “long” 5-15 page papers.** </p>
<p>Whines which often necessitates my having to suppress an urge to ROTFLOL as we’d not only have to write that much for each of our humanties/social science classes at my math/science oriented public magnet high school…we also had to submit a 20 page English thesis on top of our regular workload in order to graduate. </p>
<ul>
<li>Can’t believe how many complained about having to read 50 pages per week. That’s extremely light for a humanities/Social science course at an elite LAC/university IME.</li>
</ul>
<p>** To be fair, there are also plenty of humanities/social science majors who whine about the minimal math/science requirements.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I did. It was good relaxation.</p>
<p>*I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard STEM major classmates/colleagues whine endlessly about writing “long” 5-15 page papers. *</p>
<p>they do have a point. While some schools have lighter STEM classes to fill distribution requirements for hum majors, there aren’t usually lit for geeks courses as well.
( but they really shouldn’t whinge about writing the paper the length of what they did in high school)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>That’s all fine and well, but if he didn’t complete the school requirements (by that I mean the college professors had him take remedial courses) then he shouldn’t have been allowed to graduate.</p>
<p>I am not at all familiar with US undergraduate colleges, so I have a question. Do the papers have to be 5-15 pages? Or do they have to just get to some insights or prove a point? In my STEM major, the shorter the proof or the insight, the more elegant it was supposed to be.</p>
<p>Some things never change. I remember sitting in my fraternity house nearly half a century ago listening to my engineering brothers complain about having to take “all those B.A. courses.” As in “Why do I have to take English comp - I’m never going to be a writer?”</p>
<p>Annasdad, what did you tell them about the rationale to take English Comp? </p>
<p>I took it BTW and did well. It was a lot of fun. We didn’t call it English comp, we called it World Literature, and I let my mind loose on a new interpretation of The Life of Galileo, and drew some totally off the wall connections between that and the Metamorphosis (or was it the Castle), and the result was pure gold. </p>
<p>It all came to me when I was drinking heavily the previous night. I am not sure what the question asked, but I was keen to share my new insights with the professor, who was thrilled and asked me what I am doing majoring in computer science, and that I should go get a BA in literature instead. </p>
<p>The same happened in the World History course when I presented a totally random post-colonial interpretation of something that I do not even remember. But when I tried to pull the same stunt in Economics I totally got nailed.</p>
<p>I think I was high when I took the Philosophy exam. I didn’t attend any classes. I borrowed the notes from my buddy the night before the exam and memorized it end to end. (I was growing wiser after the economics debacle.) Don’t remember how it turned out.</p>
<p>Oh, the memories.</p>
<p>I didn’t tell them anything. At 18, I was as clueless as they were. But I now often see engineering reports full of narrative that runs way more than 5-15 pages. I’m guessing most consulting engineering firms don’t employ English majors to write their reports, and I’m guessing most savvy clients expect the reports they’re paying big bucks for to be decipherable.</p>
<p>And English Lit and English Comp are two separate animals - at least they were in my day, at the college I went to, which required all freshmen, engineers and BAs, to take two semesters of comp. Only we BAs got to go on and take English Lit as sophomores (and it was required for a BA degree; yes, it was a very different time, way back when colleges actually believed that faculties had a better idea of what it was important to know than 18-year-olds did).</p>
<p>Although I’m sure if an engineer had wanted to take English Lit as one of his distribution reqs, he would have been able to; but most of them took religion instead, because it was an easy A.</p>
<p><a href=“but%20they%20really%20shouldn’t%20whinge%20about%20writing%20the%20paper%20the%20length%20of%20what%20they%20did%20in%20high%20school”>quote=emeraldkity4</a>
[/quote]
</p>
<p>It was my high school experience, not theirs. </p>
<p>What I found which shocked me was that most US high schools…even well-off suburban ones were structured in such a way that one could go through all 4 years with writing so little that 5-10 page papers seem “heavy”. There’s a reason why even students at the most elite universities need writing remediation/tutoring from what I’ve observed as an academic tutor and from friends who TA undergrad courses at elite universities…including a few Ivies. </p>
<p>Also, the history/politics departments at my LAC didn’t have separate “easier” courses for non-majors as far as I recall. All courses were for majors and non-majors…and everyone had the same workloads…which were usually more than 50 pages/week…even in the 100 level courses. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Depends on the assignment…though IME…it isn’t only to prove one’s point…but also to show the Prof that one has a good grasp of the course material/research techniques and issues/sources covered/outside research in the semester and is able to synthesize it into a good research/expository essay of whatever required length and the corresponding degree of depth.</p>
<p>As for your experiences with the few humanities courses…I’m betting that if you tried what you did at any respectable LAC or LAC-like elite university…you’re much more likely to crash and burn with a NE*, C or B- level grade rather than an A. Saw that happen to several overconfident college classmates who thought they could put one over our Profs.</p>
<ul>
<li>That was our equivalent to an F</li>
</ul>
<p>
</p>
<p>Indeed. What alumni from my D’s high school tell me is that one of the things that distinguishes them from their peers (and many of them are going to very selective universities) is that they are not floored by the prospect of writing 20+ page papers for freshman courses - because they’ve been doing it for three years.</p>
<p>I have to say though, writing 20 page reports sounds mind numbingly boring. I don’t think I ever wrote one. The longest was probably 2 pages.</p>
<p>The longest was probably 2 pages.
lol The TA’s probably appreciated it.</p>
<p>When you’ve got nothing to say… too bad things have changed.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I think being short, pithy, and to the point is a long lost skill. This was in Business School. We were given word limits that we couldn’t cross. No one reads 20 page memos.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Many college classmates felt the same about writing and testing computer programs, mucking around with Slackware so it will run on a low-end notebooks/desktops, performing chemistry experiments with highly volatile materials in high school labs, reading about the effects of various drugs on the human body(Took a pharmacology class in high school), trying to run Windows 7RC on a Pentium II-400 with 512 MB RAM*, etc. </p>
<p>All things which I find to be quite engaging and fun…though frustrating at times. </p>
<ul>
<li>It actually ran…though most people would find it about as fast as a lobotomized snail struggling through congealed molasses.</li>
</ul>
<p>You have a lot of interests cobrat. I just wanted to study math and do nothing else.</p>
<p>I think being short, pithy, and to the point is a long lost skill.</p>
<p>Ironic, much?</p>