I think the issue is that, in a technical field, the “college book learnin’” consists of fundamental knowledge required for the job. There’s no way an English major or a finance major would be able to step into (for example) an electrical engineering job. By the same token, I’d naturally assume that an English major or EE major wouldn’t be able to step into a job in finance.
But you just said that, for you personally, “Uncle Sam gave me my job in large part because I studied international relations and history.” If you’d studied English or finance or EE, would you have gotten your job?
I understand that critical skills are really important. I think it’s just that, for many technical people (or maybe it’s just me), it’s suprising that the actual knowledge that was presumably learned isn’t important at all. If it isn’t the history or anthropology or philosophy that’s important, but only the ancillary skills, why not have a “General Liberal Arts” degree with classes like (using your list) “Writing Coherently I, II, II, and IV,” “Maintaining a Positive Attitude I,” and “Dressing Yourself” and be done with it?
Then there are those of us who have Liberal Arts degrees because that’s what we wanted to do as a career. After 10 years in the private sector, I was determined to do what I always wanted to do: teach. With a major in Anthropology and dual minors in Sociology and European History, I was prepared for all sorts of teaching assignments. Toss in the fact that I had majored in a variety of subjects over the years (Business, Criminal Justice, Geography, History, No Major Declared), which made passing the NTE(Praxis) a snap, and I’m doing just what I want with my life. With 4 credentials, 2 certificates and 20 years experience, I can write my own schedule.
Well, I would need to know more about your friends background and credentials, his actual job at that firm, etc to make a judgement. “Wall Street” isn’t a job. Is he a stockbroker? Investment bank analyst? Back office? Sales? Does he work for a bulge bracket firm like Goldman Sachs or a small boutique? Did he have relevant internships? Does he have connections? Is he academically gifted?
I guess the question I have is if you have a degree in English, how to you get noticed by the recruiter at some investment bank when you are competing against strong candidates from top schools who studied Finance, Economics, etc?
I actually had taken a lot of liberal arts classes as electives - social psychology, architecture (actually a second major for awhile), even theater. Pretty much anything I found interesting that would round out my technical (and dry) degree in engineering. I will admit the arts and science classes were a lot more interesting and fun.
Most liberal arts majors graduate with strong communication and writing skills, and these are skills that technical graduates often lack. I have a degree in Communication Arts with a specialization in Theatre but while I was in college I took many classes that were very heavy in reading and writing. I learned how to quickly do good research (many people lack this skill, I am discovering) and pull info from many sources to find important or common points.
I worked a little in a local theatre when I first graduated doing promotional work, but that was the end of the paid theatre career. Luckily I found that my skills don’t lock me in to one profession for my whole life. When I wanted to apply for other jobs, I stressed my communication, organizational and writing skills and there were many areas out there. I currently am learning more about technical writing and I work in an engineering department. While the engineers here supply me with technical info that I could not come up with on my own, there is no engineer here that is capable of pulling that info together to write a user’s manual for a product. The technical industries still need people to present their face to the world, whether that is in advertising, copywriting / editing, promotions, etc. Writing skills and research are still sought after.
Most people change careers several times in their lifetime, and a liberal arts degree gives a base to be able to do that. You may need to pick up more specialized skills as you go, but you don’t need to start over. I think maybe liberal arts majors have a bit of a slower start right out of college compared to a technical degree, we probably don’t have a starting salary that is as big. But our field is more open to different possibilites and over time I would bet the difference gets smaller.
I wonder how many people actually pick one career when they are 18, go to school for it, and stay with it until they retire. I would guess that number is pretty low, and many people end up in careers that have nothing to do with their majors. I am sure there are exceptions, especially in fields like medicine or law, but most of us with B.A.'s move around quite a bit.
Read The Organization Man by William H. Whyte, published over fifty years ago. We’ve been hashing this question out since well before then. He does make a compelling case for liberal arts, mainly based on the fact that much, if not most, of the actual work done in companies is specific to their particular business practices, and not with what most people studied in college…whatever they majored in. For instance, examples were given of a company that was able to train up non-engineering majors to do effective sales work for an engineering firm.
As an aside, is architecture considered a liberal arts major? It’s not just the art history of buildings.
It’s a science, but with more of a create flair than civil engineering. Architecture is more about the layout of spaces and how people interact with them. Civil engineering (specifically structural) is more about making it all stand up.
CE’s are constantly battling with Architects who don’t appreciate being told their vision will collapse under it’s own weight.
Perhaps they like those subjects and excel in them, and would not have succeeded in other subjects.
And what gives you the idea these people struggle to find jobs? The fact is that people who hold liberal arts degrees have far higher average incomes than the average earner. I run into them all the time.
Like most “why do people do this” threads, though, I don’t think you’re seriously asking the question, or want an honest answer.
Kind of surprising, that. I’d have thought that architects have enough engineering drilled into them that they wouldn’t make mistakes of that type. The fact that even today we still see some spectacular–and usually tragic–structural failures shows that the best person doesn’t always win that argument.
I am really not sure yet. I am trying to keep an open mind and see what grabs me. Judging by the majority of history related material on the bookshelf, I tend to gravitate towards modern U.S. political history. I hope to move to the UK at some point, though, so I don’t know how useful this would be. I can’t help but be somewhat rational.
This reminds me of an intern we had last summer at my company (who has since been hired on full time). She got the internship through an MBA program at a nice school but it took her a while to catch onto how things really are in an office. After a couple of meeting requests, she finally had to ask people on my team where the agendas were because her professors told her to never go to a meeting where the organizer had not sent out a detailed agenda. I guess in a perfect world, that’d be fantastic. At our company, you’re lucky if the organizer shows up on time.
FWIW, I was an English major with a minor in History, which has never hindered me in the real world. I work in data analysis.
Structural failures are usually due to either an engineering flaw or shoddy workmanship (or an unforseen catastrophic event). AFAIK, ultimately only P.E. (certified Professional Engineer) can sign off on blueprints for construction. An architect can’t.
From what I’ve read, they struggle more initially to find jobs. At the entry levels, companys need worker-bees, not high-minded strategic thinkers. Half the people I interview tell me they “want a position of leadership where they can manage others”. Um…yeah…me too. That’s why I’m here hiring people I can delegate actual work to.
After a couple years of work experience, I think a liberal arts degree might lend itself to getting into better business or law schools because it’s more of an “academic” degree.
Every company has it’s own culture and it’s own way of doing things. One thing I liked about my MBA program was that in addition to the technical (finance, accounting) and soft classes (marketing, org b), there were a lot of group projects. Ultimately, business is about relationships and teamwork and you only learn that by working on a team. You start to see that everyone has strengths and weaknesses that must be accounted for and that most people don’t perform like robots.
> For the purpose of this discussion, I’m referring to non-business, non-
> engineering and non-career specific (architecture, etc) majors. At my college,
> Architecture was part of the School of Arts & Sciences (disparagingly refered to
> as the School of Arts and Crafts by bus and eng majors), not the School of
> Engineering so I think of it as “liberal arts”.
Regardless of where architecture is taught in your college, it’s closer to engineering in terms of preparation for a job, as I understand it. You leave college with a bachelor’s degree in engineering and you get an entry-level job in engineering (assuming that there are jobs open). You leave college with a bachelor’s degree in architecture and you get an entry-level job in engineering (assuming that there are jobs open). You leave college with a bachelor’s degree in physics or chemistry and your professors ask, “So are you going on to grad school?” There are jobs that hire bachelor’s degree in physics or chemistry, I suppose, but they’re called lab technicians or something, not physicist or chemist. In terms of job preparation, architecture is closer to engineering, business, or nursing than to liberal arts subjects.
Furthermore, I don’t understand why you would think that many of the liberal arts majors don’t lead to well-paid jobs. I assumed that most of the people I knew in college who were majoring in history or political science were going to go on to law school. Most of them could have done so if they had wanted to.
With my journalism and political science degrees, I went looking for newspaper and magazine jobs. I got a newspaper internship, which soon turned into a paying job, and there you go, it was paying the bills within a few months, before I even graduated.
Granted, not a life of luxury, but self-supporting at 22, fresh out of college, debt-free, isn’t a bad way to be. I worked there for 6 years after that.
Since then, I’ve worked in tech writing for a DoD contractor, graphic design for a large real estate company and a large beer company, college admissions, more graphic design, etc. I don’t need to work for money anymore.
I don’t really understand the scorn for liberal arts degrees. It’s not such a terrible thing to read a few books, learn something about human culture, or appreciate the arts.
True to a point. For single-family residential, a contractor can sign off on blueprints. For anything other than that (commercial, mixed use housing, apartments, small gas station), a licensed architect as to sign off on plans, and although contractors are liable for one year after construction, an architect is liable for six years after construction.
I’ve sort of been following this thread and I am not too attached to it, I am surprised the OP has such a strong bias against the liberal arts. Most jobs don’t care what degree you have, as long as you have the experience/knowledge to know the job. Most individuals major in the liberal arts bc they have a strong passion for it.
I mentioned this before in another thread, but what I was in undergrad, I loved loved loved music. So what did I do? Although I majored in History, I ended up interning at a major record label for most of my time in undergrad. Did they care? No, they just wanted to see I had a 4 year degree that reflected the fact I could critically analyze and I could write a decent sentence or two. In fact, most of the people in music biz didn’t major in Music, or Business - most were Poli Sci, English, no college degree at all majors. As the example I stated before, Michael Eisner has a B.A. in English… that’s it! look how far that got him.
Same deal w/ technical jobs. I know many people in undergrad that got jaded with the CS major. Too many people, work not challenging enough - so they ended up dropping out of CS majors and got random ass majors, like Psychology. Does Google care? Not really. They want to see you got the experience to back you resume up. I have many friends who work for hi-tech firms that don’t necessarily have a B.S degree, but have the skills to be competitive in that field.