The Case For Removing (Almost) All Liberal Arts From College

[Vosem]

I agree with the article in spirit -- there's not much point in going to college to major in liberal arts -- but not in fact -- as long as the market does exist for liberal arts majors that is largely perpetuated by government-subsidized student loans, colleges should continue teaching liberal arts.

FTFY

So?

[politicus]

The best solution is to make liberal art majors much harder so they become elite studies (at least at decent universities). If only bright people get history degrees there will be a market for those graduates. Both academic careers and employers that need intelligent generalists. Any subject can be taught at an advanced level and things like linguistics and philosophy doesnt have to be easier subjects than biology or business.

[HoosierPoliticalJunkie]

As a student, I do significantly better in my precalc, chem, and physics courses than my Honors English course.

I hate English literature classes with a passion(I'm fine with writing, vocabulary, and grammar though). 

Because of this, I guess my wholehearted support of the article is a tad biased. 

[Kaine for Senate '18]

My reaction - disgust.

The usual bollocks. Not even worth engaging with.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

My reaction - disgust.

The usual bollocks. Not even worth engaging with.

[Foucaulf]

For your information, the writer made a follow-up post on his blog. The argument there is more standard:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Just some points:

-The options the writer talks about for self-learning in the humanities (Amazon books, online discussion) are there for the STEM stuff; in fact, STEM self-learning is more useful. Engineering schools have a reputation for weeding out students and substandard instruction. Or math: instead of wading through a chunky calculus textbook designed for engineers, buy some used paperback advanced calculus books (with proof) and use Stackexchange.

-Liberal arts majors who advocate for STEM aren't knowledgeable about what the promised "information economy" will look like. In fact, no one really know what it will look like. All we know at this point is certain skills that should be of use: experience around a lab, programming, data management. So it's not so much that we need more STEM majors as people who take classes on Python or MySQL.

-Critical reading remains a huge issue. Articulate writing is an even bigger issue, which plagues even elite universities. The bigger crisis is not the private universities and their elaborate tuition system, but the rise in prices of public schools. People going into public schools cannot write well enough to succeed in their first year, and the price gives them greater incentives to drop out.

-As time goes on, the idea of what a university-level class will look like will change. MOOCs is the first salvo on an attack against costly lectures. It's not then the price of lectures I'm concerned with, but the value of a "college experience". Employers want the laundry list of achievements through college that show a diligent work ethic. The college experience is about freedom of choice. When these interests collide, which side wins?

[angus]

things like linguistics and philosophy doesnt have to be easier subjects than biology or business.

?!

I seriously doubt that anyone thinks linguistics and philosophy are easier subjects than biology or business.  

Well, there might be somebody.  I've had business courses and philosophy courses and thought the philosophy much more challenging.  My undergraduate degree is in math and my graduate degrees are in chemistry and physics and all those majors usually make the "top ten" hardest majors list in the popular articles, but I think music is probably the hardest major to complete in four years.  Anyway, "hardest" and "easiest" is subjective.   

I disagree that somebody ought to go out of his way to make a major more difficult.  I think it should be rigorous, and committees should decide upon what to include as required, and it should be approved by the appropriate bodies, but if you set upon the task with the specific goal of making it harder then you're not helping anyone.  You scare off potential candidates and risk excluding relevant material.  FWIW, I also disagree with the current trend of creating "easier" programs for students which universities are doing, typically to enroll more students so they can get more money.  Hard and easy are not only subjective qualifiers, but they are also consequences of a set of talents and interests someone possesses.  They should not be goals of the administration.

[angus]

For your information, the writer made a follow-up post on his blog.

More ranting, just longer than the first article.  His basic frustration stems from the fact that it was so expensive for him.  It is far too expensive.  I think we all agree on that particular aspect of higher education (and medical services.)  We probably disagree on how to fix the problem, but I think we can all agree that good and serious students should not be prevented from attending university solely because of the cost of tuition.

As for his pushing the sciences, I'd agree that it's good.  I'm for more gadgets to do stuff and more people trained to invent those gadgets.  But one of the most important parts of both basic and applied science is to be able to communicate one's results to others.  Students have enough trouble already putting together coherent sentences, and if we don't require them to study English, it would be an even bigger problem.  As for history and politics and the fine arts requirements, I think that the idea is that universities are expected to churn out well-informed citizens.  If you only have the training to invent a nuclear weapon but you don't have the moral and historical perspective to understand what your weapon can do, then you aren't really a net benefit to society.

If this guy wants to push trade schools and for-profit, get-finished-in-three-years-or-less type engineering programs, then by all means, he has that right, but I really don't think he has made a coherent case for the abandonment of liberal arts requirements in universities.

[Cory]

I've always thought this kind of stuff is mostly just Elitism on behalf of math & science majors. The article is laden with innuendo and generalizations to defame the Arts.

[John Dibble]

I think the main problem is that anyone who wants to pursue a liberal arts major needs some serious career counseling early in their college career and they really don't get that. It's perfectly fine to get a liberal arts major if that's what you want to pursue, but if you expect to be able to use it to get a job you really need to have an idea of what you're doing. It may be good to require some elective classes that give some business or technical skills for those pursuing liberal arts so that they have some job skills that can be applied elsewhere.

As far as STEM majors go, I think it's still good to have liberal arts electives for interested parties. I took three semesters of Japanese in college, but I only needed two for a humanities requirement and could have taken an easier language. I did the third one because I wanted to.

[Torie]

Without reading anything here, let me note this. Getting a liberal arts education is all about developing yourself as a person - to live not just a life, but the good life, and to ponder just what sort of person that you want to be, and to savor what our culture has to offer, and enjoy it. It also gives you more peripheral vision as it were, when trying to solve problems, and of course helps with logical thinking, reading complex texts, and expressing yourself with clarity and precision.

Yes, it is luxury, which, given how hideously expensive colleges are these days, may not be affordable to many, which is a pity. So one is left with balancing the economics of it - the extra cost - with whether the end product of giving one a more satisfying, and probably becoming more effective in whatever one's career may end up being, is worth that cost.

Thank you.

[Cory]

It may be good to require some elective classes that give some business or technical skills for those pursuing liberal arts so that they have some job skills that can be applied elsewhere.

But, but that would be an initiation of force adjusting the voluntary contract between liberal arts students and their colleges.