Liberal Arts Education

Rick Scott, the governor of Florida and a sweetheart of the Tea Party doesn’t believe in liberal arts education. He believes that colleges need to teach science and technology, engineering and mathematics and not bother with the social sciences. Or, in his words, “we don’t need a lot of anthropologists in the state.” He wants degrees that translate, in his opinion, into jobs. Now he would include in college curriculum economics and business management, but I would guess it would be microeconomics he would encourage rather than macroeconomics.

I’ve heard this argument most of my life. College kids saying just give me the courses I want and can use. Forget English, history, psychology, sociology, anthropology, philosophy and the like, they’re just a waste of my time. Or, a lot of college kids want technical college degrees but the term B.A. or B.S. behind them. A lot of colleges, especially online colleges are giving them exactly what they want.

As a result of all this, in my humble opinion, we have a lot the technically capable folk who have a very limited understanding the world in which they live, the history of how we got here, and little about social interaction based upon reason. It is also pretty well known and documented that a college degree just means you are educable, and the particular degree means little in terms of earning power.

Historically college professors and academic type folk tend to be liberal in their politics and business folk tend to be conservative. So, Scott may well have a political agenda in his ideas about college education. He wants more people like himself, with a business degree and a law degree and was a trucker.

In my opinion all college degreed folk need competency in English, so they can communicate understandably, the need sociology and psychology to understand how the human psyche works, they need political science to become sensible voters, they need basic economics to understand how economies work on more than just a personal level, and a little philosophy and the ability to analyze and think clearly couldn’t hurt. We need broadly educated people to make solid decisions in an increasing complicated world.

More so, we need college graduates that are informed on social, moral, and ethical values. Colleges need to provide guidance in this area as well. Some time ago I read that business school found that the needed to add business ethics to their curriculum as their graduates just lacked understanding in this area. It is all too easy today to form “bottom line” thinking, “the end justifies the means,” attitudes and an ethics of convenience. As our society becomes increasing secular and materialistic, core ethical values are being lost. The actions of Wall Street and Bank CEOs speak loudly in this area as they heap bonuses upon themselves and turn a blind eye to a hurting middle class. Without good moral values our ability to trust diminishes and the fear mongers flourish.