Fifty years ago when I was in engineering school, you were required to minor in a Humanities subject. The idea was that this not be a survey course, and that you take 5 or 6 progressively more demanding courses in a single area. Most of my classmates seemed to study English or American history and were left with stacks of books to read, along with the Calculus, Chemistry and Physics that were essential to us earning a living. This seemed like a misapplication of resources to me.
Surveying the field, I noticed that the Art History department at WPI was so highly regarded that many of the Division I basketball players from Holy Cross traveled cross town to attend classes. This insight was rewarded with a large textbook full of pictures and exams that consisted of a slide show of 25 or 30 images where students were asked to identify the artist and the title of the piece of art. I breezed through all my Art History courses and wrote an 80 page essay as the 6th and final course, all by the end of Freshman Year, while most of my classmates operating with a large reading load didn’t complete their Humanities program until the send of Sophomore Year.
I’m pretty sure that all my classmates were adept at reading, but was that the best use of their time? I graduated in 3 years and got to earn that big engineering salary a year earlier. At the time, 3 years of tuition and room and board was about equal to my starting salary, making the education almost “cost free”.
Same nonsense at Whatsa Matta U. Everyone took “non-western world”. The lectures were all on video tape, shown in large, theater style, lecture halls. Then more time was lost in “discussion” sessions in normal sized classrooms. Must have been frustrating for the profs, because they knew no-one cared about the material. They were all there because a certain number of “general education” credits were required to graduate.
The most interesting thing about that class, was that my discussion sessions were led by this man.
He joined Western Michigan University as an associate professor in 1971 and retired in 1993. By 2011, it was reported that he was suffering from dementia. He died on August 3, 2012,
I went to Brooklyn College (C.U. N.Y.) at age 16, having graduated from high school #10 in a class of over 1,000. This was an excellent high school and 125 seniors earned a N.Y. State Regent’s Scholarship. (I had the highest score in the school.)
Since I had just survived a potentially fatal illness with a major operation (splenectomy) my mother wanted me to live at home. I was OK with that.
Between the Regent’s Scholarship and my home domicile, college cost my family nothing.
My scholarship covered everything so I took all the courses I wanted. I belonged to the Scholar’s Program so I had no limit on credits. (The limit for most students was 17 credits per semester.)
I took a double major in Chemistry and Biology. But I also took 2 semesters of Physics and also Calculus. I love humanities of all kinds so I took Art History, Classics, Acting, Music History, Psychology, among others. I’m sure they were required but these were “dessert” to help me relax between the science lab courses – all easy As because they were like eating chocolate cake by comparison. I took as many as 21 credits a semester. The hardest semester I took Organic Chemistry, Microbiology, Genetics and Physics all at the same time. That was a lot even for me and I never took 4 science courses at once again in college. I would do college all over again because it was so much fun.
When I was a senior after 4 years at age 20 the school sent me a letter saying that I had (I forget how many) hundreds of credits — so graduate already and get out of here!!!
After college I went to S.U.N.Y. Stony Brook for graduate school in Chemistry with a full scholarship. My teaching assistanceship covered my living expenses so I moved into the dorm and wasn’t a burden to my parents.
I got my M.S. in Organic Chemistry at age 23.
Once I was in the corporate world my companies paid for night courses for my M.B.A.
I don’t consider Humanities courses to be a waste of time if they are free and enjoyable. If students are paying by the credit and they aren’t pertinent I agree with you. One would hope that adults would seek out the information on their own after college if they want to.
I’ll take it one step further. I don’t think they are a waste of time even if they are not free or even enjoyable. Not all education, intelligence, or wisdom need be for the sole purpose of earning an income. Much life is simply being a productive member of a community (both small and large) regardless of education attainment, wealth, or income and having a well rounded education, one that has a better understanding of the world, is a benefit to both the student and the non-student.
@Hawkwin my entire life is a study to figure out what’s going on. Science for the inanimate world. Psychology for relationships. History for a larger perspective of social organization.
I agree with you that these are important. The lack of education causes people to make bad choices.
Wendy
Not necessarily. My sister has her PhD from Duke. Her life has been a series of bad choices.
My brother-in-law had a PharmD. Again, he led a life that was full of bad choices.
Just two examples that I’ve personally witnessed. I believe no matter how well educated you are, if you don’t have a bit of common sense the education will not benefit you.
@gcr2016 and I know people who make excellent choices with minimal education and average or lower book-learning intelligence because they have good values and common sense. But I still think that education moves the odds in the right direction.
Wendy
I don’t have a problem with Humanities education.But if you’re paying for it at an expensive private college and the Public Library is free, you want to dispense with the requirement in the most cost efficient way possible.
That was a tough sell in engineering school with starting salaries so high. Also, you really didn’t get compensated for the time lost in grad school. When I was working for Exxon, a BS grad started at Salary grade 25 and were promoted to Grade 26 within 2 years (just like the Army.) An MS grad also started at grade 25, but would usually get promoted to Grade 26 in a year. So 2 years after college graduation they were earning about the same, except the MS grad lost a year’s worth of salary to his graduate program. Once you have 5 years experience, no one cares where you went to school or what degree you have. It’s all about your work history and accomplishments.
I also got a free, company paid MBA from Syracuse and time off to attend classes, but never did anything with it since I was already making more as an engineer than the highest salaries offered to Syracuse MBA grads at the time. I really wonder about the kids who are quitting a $250,000/yr petroleum engineering job today, taking 2 years off, and paying $200,000 tuition for a Harvard MBA. Putting that $700,000 in an S&P 500 index fund over the next 40 years would secure a well upholstered retirement.
That was not my experience in art history. Of course we had changed from “Rules of Design” to our readings in “Principles of Design”. The difference in education was huge.
I never memorized a painting’s title to pass a test. Or the dates an artist lived. That was not considered important in art history.
That reminds me of the son of a prominent political leader in our area. His sister was best friends with mine. He got a shock one day when he was into the Dean’s office. He thought he was in trouble. He was doing repo on the side. The guy was huge and armed. He was sneaking around the ghetto repossessing cars.
The Dean told him he had earned enough credits for a master’s in philosophy.
I took a double degree, BA political theory and BS mathematical engineering. I have extremely happy for them both, and have labored and grown moderately wealthy pursuing both.
The course that utterly changed my life was titled something like “English Poetry from Reformation to Present”. Wrestling with what in heck was going on in the minds of
Andrew Marvell with “Coy Mistress”,
Christopher Smart with his cat Jeoffrey in a lunatic asylum
Terrifying overwhelming truths of recent time from
and this from Eliot’s last poem Journey of the Magi:
All this was a long time ago, I remember,
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we led all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly
We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.
Wrestling myself into comprehension of those densely packed info/myth bombs led me to gobble down mathematical complexity theory with a sense of mortality, and dig into Aristotle, Machiavelli, Montesquieu, Max Weber, and Habermas like my life depended on their thoughts…. which was, I believe, the truth.
The end of liberal education springs from the end of serious rootedness in historical human life, and an increasing bedazzlement with mere power and trinkets.
I did a rather mathematical economics degree and we had to do one or two humanitarian subjects in our first year. Economics is something of a behavioral subject and I got interested in why so many educated people made so many bad choices (very true in economics). This led me to the works of people like Cipolla, an Italian economist, who suggested that stupidity was completely separate from intelligence and education. Also worth a look is the work of Dietrich Bonhoeffer who looked more at collective stupidity, what Huxley described as ‘herd poison’.
Someone could be educated, intelligent and stupid. Stupid people are the most dangerous as they cannot be reasoned with, which all other types of people can be.
While 90% of my degree time was spent on economics I benefited from my exposure to the humanities.
I came from a poor background (social housing) so my education was free and I received a generous grant. This has now changed completely, so I’m not sure if I would be going to university today.
