Eliminating English and Liberal Arts Majors

It is sad that Post University is eliminated English major and upper level liberal arts courses. What good is an English major? Well before there was Film Studies and Communication majors, graduates with an English degree went into those fields. How about Technical Writing? I was taught to believe that a liberal arts education meant that besides your major, you would be able to think critically, write well, speak well, speak another language, understand and appreciate art, music and culture. It is interesting that at the United States Naval Academy, you can graduate with a Bachelor of Science degree in English(the only such institution in the United States that does so). So I guess it is the “invisible hand of the free market” is guiding the choices of Post and it’s trustees, not the standards of the New England Association of Schools and Colleges.

Paul Roden, Training Manager at La Salle University, at 8:55 am EST on November 29, 2005

Who really believes in a liberal education?

I presume Post’s board and officers are college graduates, yet seem to eschew the idea of Liberal Studies. Corporations who voice the litany about Liberal Studies still hire these graduates. Students and parents who write the checks for tuition and expenses don’t seem to be voting with their feet or check books. The public at large, the boards that license institutions haven’t raised their voices, execised their powers or made other moves other than some feeble ululations.

Yes, there are still “liberal arts” institutions and degrees; and they are not, I hope, about to vanish like the passenger pigeon.

But, one might ask whether The Academy has lost its bully pulpit.

thoughts?

tom abeles, editor at On the Horizon, at 10:51 am EST on November 29, 2005

And the pendulum swings again

It’s the eternal debate. Is the purpose of education the production of highly-developed human beings, or is it practical skills training?

Ideally, of course, we want the best of both worlds: graduates who can quote Dostoevsky while carrying out their duties effectively and efficiently. But there are only so many days in the year, and when push comes to shove seomething has to be given top priority.

If we’re seeing a movement away from liberal arts toward technical proficiency, in a while we’ll see a counter-movement when people start complaining that their employees are all headless automata. Okay maybe the “headless automata” part was a bit of an exaggeration, but still...

Charles Hackney, PhD, psychology professor at Redeemer University College, at 12:09 pm EST on November 29, 2005

Don’t worry, the elites of this world — and the country — will always have classical liberal educations. Indeed, amongst rich people, it is usually considered “low class” to even study business – especially as an undergraduate.

The only people that think that there is something to be gained by sending their kids to a trade school (or a college pretending to be one) is the “under 100k set” and nobody listens to them, anyway.

Now, perhaps, this school is just altering its business model to provide specific training to corporations that want people (already with degrees) to learn specific skills, and giving up on its charade of being a place where people get some of that “education” stuff. This might not be such a bad idea.

Larry, at 1:21 pm EST on November 29, 2005

ending history and literature majors

The liberal arts have fallen so far behind the times they have brought this situation on themselves. They are badly fragmented with little contact between the discplines, and little inclinded to learn from each other. The nice thing about a business major is that business has to integrate the various disciplines into a real world outcome. I teach plenty of history in both my economics and organization courses, and of a kind most conventional history courses could not do. How many history courses can explain how Britain’s enclosure movement led to the commodity theory of labor or the Theory X top-down management style? Not many I suspect.

Don Wallace, Dean, Business School at St. Martin’s University, at 5:09 pm EST on November 29, 2005

Training vs Education

Training = specific preparation of the skills needed to perform the functions of a certain kind of job, whether at a non-, para- or professional level. Training is relatively (or sometimes quite) narrowly focused on a specific occupation and designed to produce workers for that occupation, including workers on a managerial level. Skills are the core of training. Some of these skills may require some or a lot of understanding of theoretical concepts, while others require no theoretical comprehension. Finally, training usually (if not always) focuses on a specific kind of critical thinking/problem solving approach.

Education = development of both the ability to think critically from more than one perspective and an understanding of the way in which a person relates to one’s culture (and other cultures). Education can include training, but is not identical to it or reducible to it; education that includes training helps a person understand how the specific vocational skills she or he is being taught fit into a larger cultural framework.

Liberal arts courses that make up the core of “higher” education include mathematics and science (hopefully, on a post-high school level), as well as other languages, history, economics, etc. But, of course, most of the examples associated with the discussion of this article locate literature courses as those which seem most “irrelevant.” The value of a literature course is not to enable people to quote Dostoevsky at some cocktail party; rather, the value of courses in which students read Dostoevsky, Dickinson, Shakespeare, Cervantes, LeGuin and others is centered in pleasure (regarding the worlds that can be experienced, the language/artistic play involved, the thematic insights offered) and in the analytical and communicative skills that are developed.

Don Wallace notes “I teach plenty of history in both my economics and organization courses, and of a kind most conventional history courses could not do.” But economics is widely considered to be one of the liberal arts; that, plus the fact that he integrates a historical, presumably somewhat theoretical approach into his organization course(s), means that the graduates of his business programs are being educated—an education that includes training.

Nothing is wrong with career training; for economic survival purposes, that may be all a person needs (or that may be all a government grant is willing to fund, even if a person wants the larger conceptual framework that education affords); however, it should not be called “education.”

CJO, at 7:44 pm EST on November 29, 2005

It’s fine to have any kind of schooling. Trade school, professional school, anything. I do think that offering one kind of education and calling is something else is counterfeiting, though. Offering a a vocational program but marketing it as a Bachelors Degree is inappropriate. They say the new model is just as good, no it’s even better, but will name it the same as the old discarded model which I guess must still have the desired label. Does honest Vo-Tech lack that classy Latin panache? A “Bachelor” of What?

Mickie, at 8:27 am EST on November 30, 2005

Eliminating Liberal Arts

I’ve a better idea—let’s eliminate schools like Post from the American landscape. There are already schools where one only ‘reads’ (takes courses) in one’s major; they’re called foreign universities. So I say ‘Sayonara’ to Post—let them pack it up and send it Toyko.

Okay, the above was a rant, but the serious side of this is that Post is one of series of colleges that feels it can’t maintain the broad array of offerings that define American higher ed. Narrowcasting isn’t the answer to this. There’s a reason why US higher ed is still regarded as the best in the world: because we educate the whole person rather than cranking out little corporate clones.

Post isn’t the only school to go this route, nor is it the only one searching to keep its bottom line afloat. As draconian as it may sound, I rather suspect the real answer for those who can’t offer across the spectrum is to get out of the game altogether (or merge with others). I know that sounds harsh, but are we really serving students or the nation well if we create a system where some students get substandard preparation?

Those who think that vo-tech education alone is adequate need to take an intro sociology course—the sort Post would eliminate—and learn a basic social axiom: technology changes faster than institutions. That’s why we teach the liberal arts: it makes students capable of thinking and adapting. (Or have we forgotten about all those computer programmers we created 5 yrs. ago who can’t find jobs now b/c software packages do what they used to write?)

Rob, at 1:34 pm EST on December 2, 2005

“In times of change, the learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists” — Eric Hoffer

A Russell, Senior Years English Teacher at Private School, at 11:10 am EST on December 7, 2005

Sign of the times

I’m not surprised to see English departments closing, as at Post. I agree that the discipline wrote itself into a useless, arcane corner. The only vibrant parts of the discipline are writing and ESL (which have a practical focus—go figure!). I ran screaming from graduate school in English because I didn’t want to study “constructing the ‘other’” or “antifeminism in Book X.” Ugh! I’m much happier teaching college students effective writing skills that they can use regardless of their career choice.

By the way, to the writer who said the Naval Academy has the only B.S. in English: I must correct you. My B.S. in English is from Ball State University.

Kathy, Instructor, at 3:10 pm EST on December 8, 2005

Not every institution needs to be everything to everybody.

There are still plenty of places where you can pursue an English major.

Majoring in English is not a dead end. What may be true is that majors that have had small numbers become safe havens for weaker students, or the unmotivated. As long as the better students in the major can distinguish themselves from weaker students they are attractive to businesses, law schools, and even MBA programs — much more than an average business student.

John B. Chilton, at 7:46 am EST on December 22, 2005