"If we are to navigate skillfully the
turbulent changes of the twenty-first century, we must educate
students not only to process information but to think wisely and
well," says President Creighton.
A shorter version of this piece by
President Creighton ran in the November 28 Springfield (MA) Sunday Republican.
by Joanne V. Creighton
During the week of November 15, nearly
300 colleges and universities from around the country carried out a
special series of outreach activities aimed at middle and high school
students as part of the first-ever National College Week. Organized
by the U.S. Department of Education and numerous organizations,
National College Week sought to drive home the message that, with
proper academic preparation and informed financial planning,
Americans can achieve their dreams of a college education.
It is an important message: American
students and their parents should know that college education is both
attainable and affordable, in part through the wide-ranging loan and
grant programs made available by national and state governments,
private organizations, and by colleges and universities themselves.
This might also be a good time to ask
a more fundamental question: is higher education good for America? In
other words, are we educating young people as effectively as possible
to meet our challenging future?
Certainly, study after study shows
that those with college degrees enjoy, on average, a higher degree of
financial success than many of their counterparts who have attained
only a high school diploma. But the economic benefits should be only
one reason, and not the most important, for a national effort to
bring more students to college.
If we are to navigate skillfully the
turbulent changes of the twenty-first century, we must educate
students not only to process information effectively but to think
wisely and well. To my mind, nothing fosters that end better than a
liberal arts education.
Now I know to some people liberal
education--the disinterested pursuit of knowledge as its own end
without immediate application--may seem like an outdated idea
appropriate for an aristocratic elite of an earlier age, but not now
useful for those of us who must work and deal with the day-to-day,
ever-changing, modern world. On the contrary, I'm convinced that now
more than ever a liberal arts education "works." Let me first defend
its "nonutilitarian" nature.
I believe some vestiges of the ivory
tower should coexist with the fast-track, high-tech world. We still
need havens where the serenity of a contemplative mind can be
fostered: where the joys of learning for learning's sake are
appreciated; where students can ponder great books without regard for
their vocational application. Liberal education at its best is, in
fact, revolutionary. It transforms students; it awakens them to a
fuller life of the mind; it causes them to question their goals and
values; it makes them better companions to themselves.
"The soul selects her own society,
then shuts the door," says Emily Dickinson, and it is certainly
true--as Lily Tomlin has added--that "we're all in this alone." But,
it is also true that "we're all in this together," bounded each to
each, through culture and history and through our shared use of this
finite planet. Much can be learned about the continuities as well as
the changes in human history by studying the liberal arts and
sciences. It has been said, for example, that the forms of art
reflect the history of humanity ever more truthfully than documents;
and what pleasures they have to offer to the human spirit as well.
To be sure, majoring in art or ancient
history, philosophy, dance or physics or any other number of liberal
arts subjects might seem downright impractical. "What are you going
to do with it?" people will ask. But the good news and the
"utilitarian" part of my argument -- is that a liberal arts
education, although it often works in an indirect and ineffable way,
turns out to be highly useful. It helps to develop the skills, the
knowledge, the critical thinking, the quality of mind, the reflective
habits, the ethical perspectives that are needed to live a productive
and fulfilling life.
Moreover, liberal arts graduates often
make better employees, study after study has shown. For example, AT
& T studied the career spans of two generations of corporate
managers and found that liberal arts graduates excelled over business
and engineering majors in almost every category: in leadership,
communication, analytical skills, and career success. Why? Because,
in part, their education prepared them for change. Liberal arts
graduates are potentially better citizens because their understanding
of the present is informed by a sense of the past, and it is true
that "those who ignore the past are doomed to repeat it."
Liberal arts education fosters what
John Cardinal Newman called a philosophical habit of mind, a
skepticism, a confidence in the powers of one's own mind, a
self-reliance, which are useful in all sorts of practical and
pragmatic ways, and these qualities inform the best kind of
democratic citizenry.
In sum, the best way to prepare our
young people for the inevitable and far-reaching changes that they
will experience in their personal and civic lives is to encourage
them to take up and to extend the incredibly rich legacy of human
knowledge encapsulated in the liberal arts and sciences. I put my
hope for the future in the paradoxically conservative and
revolutionary nature of liberal arts education.
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