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Don't run away from a liberal arts degree, but pair it up with something concrete that matches up with your interests.
For example "communications" is bad. "sociology" is bad.
Cultural Communication + Arabic OR Sociology + a Geography minor are interesting, and can also be transferred to a career path. You can be a translator, work in the Foreign service in the first case. In the second example, you can work in an Urban Planning department.
The problem is lots of people end up in liberal studies by default, or do it aimlessly because it's "Fun" or easy. You should do it because you like it, but have a plan.
That said, give me liberal arts over being a lifeless MBA or computer major any day. While some genuinely love computers or number crunching which this doesn't apply to, there's a lot of folks who resign themselves to "doing IT" because "that's why the money is". They seem so soulless and defeated when I run into them.
The problem is not a Liberal Arts major per se. It's having a GENERAL liberal arts major by default that's a problem.
Actually, I wrote that to make a point. A business degree is incredibly generic in nature and really doesn't teach anyone but a smattering of things. At least a liberal arts degree teaches on how to accumulate abstract information and synthesize it into a coherent theme.
cpg, you reliably make posts indicative of a critical thinker.
I'm going to go "yes" and "no" on this one. Business is indeed a generic undergrad and the different majors within it, and the GPAs that go along with them, are indicative of job prospects and level of discipline. In most colleges, accounting requires about 24 sem. hrs. of sequenced courses, and those who can't handle it fall back on the generic business degree, taking a sampling of management, marketing, and theory courses, much like an appetizer plate at a restaurant.
However, upon looking at the courses required in a business curriculum, it provides one of the better juxtapositions of quantitative and qualitative thinking. A person who pulls upward of a 3.7 in a quantitative business discipline is generally very smart, particularly if from a good school. I knew some people from my college with such backgrounds who were admitted to law school at UCLA, Berkeley and Yale, and one person who was admitted to Stanford's MBA program. Without a doubt, a 3.7 in business from Virginia lives on a different planet than does a 2.5 from UWF who was working on their tan at Pensacola Beach. (I'm jealous).
The "black eye" for the business major is the obtuse surfer or ditz who doesn't want to major in liberal arts and majors in business instead. Their grades are low, their absorption is questionable, and they rely on their looks or family connections to get ahead. That's why more technical majors love to rag on business majors. In fact, business majors are ragged on more than liberal arts majors because of the cattle prod stereotypes, whereas some people genuinely have in interest in English literature or geography. I never looked down on liberal arts majors. I did, however, wonder what their next steps were going to be. I would have gladly majored in foreign languages and feel certain I would have blown the doors off a lot of students, because my passion for this topic is so intense.
As for me, all of my education is practical/technical, but this never made me question my abilities in the verbal realm. I "tore up" on standardized verbal tests since I was a little squirt. I also received flattering comments from professors for how well technically oriented papers were written.
In closing, I think: a) if a person has a passion for a specific liberal arts topic or wants a general education, they should do just that, and b) if a person opts for a technical education, they shouldn't poo-poo the soft skills, which round out someone's education and possibilities in life.
Last edited by robertpolyglot; 10-06-2012 at 03:40 PM..
I went to go watch the debates yesterday with a buddy and some of his college friends were there and I was surprised to see a lot of them where poly sci/liberal arts majors. It got me thinking that if the economy is so bad, shouldn't people be majoring in things that are practical? I mean I'm not against the liberal arts in fact, I enjoy them, but I thought things changed after the recession or is it just me?
I'm double majoring in two programs that allegedly boast good employment out of school and good starting salaries. Know how many internships I've had? Zero. ****, I don't think I'm even gonna get a job at my school's security center monitoring security cameras.
The employment prospects are ****ty for anybody not majoring in engineering, and not everybody is cut out for that. Even engineering isn't a sure bet any more. Might as well study something you enjoy if the end result is gonna be the same.
I work in recruiting and staffing for a large Fortune 500 Company and we get thousands of resumes from liberal arts majors asking for a job, any job. Some tell us to pick the right job for them and they will do it. Many others want to get into a so called management training program where they expect us to hire them without any identifiable career skills and train them to become a manager in one of our functional departments. With rare exceptions so called management trainee programs do not exist anymore. 99% of these liberal arts graduates resume end up in the waste basket.
I don't have a problem with liberal arts degrees except for many of them the cost is ridiculously high. As most here know it isn't tuition but all the other costs associated with college that can easily add up to $20 to $30k/year when you consider everything. Tuition, books, dorm or shared apartment, living expenses, food, the car you use and the gasoline you put in it. These are all costs associated with attending college Add to this pile the missed income, even at $10/hr, that you could have earned had you not gone to college and true costs could end up being closer to $40k/year.
My daughter graduated in 2002 and except for the $2,500 student loan I made her get every year, I wanted her to have some skin in the game, I paid all of her expenses and I know it ran $25,000 because I paid the bills and gave her spending money. While costing some tuition and books weren't all that bad. It was the apartment she shared with utilities, her car payment, $100/week food etc. etc that added up over time.
But she made it, did well and I would do it all again but what if a student couldn't get the help from their parents. Then what; go $100k in debt praying they will get that great job and be able to pay the $800/month loan payment?
At 18 young people think youth goes on forever and four years is light years away but we who are older know it is just the blink of an eye. We also understand it's complete rubbish to be in a lower paid field because you "have a passion for it" because money does count later on. Try having a wife and two young kids without enough money to make ends meet and tell me how happy you are with your sociology field.
The problem with studying liberal arts is that people never finish their education. And then they have few job prospects. There's nothing wrong about liberal arts if you finish higher education.
I don't have a problem with liberal arts degrees except for many of them the cost is ridiculously high.
At 18 young people think youth goes on forever and four years is light years away but we who are older know it is just the blink of an eye. We also understand it's complete rubbish to be in a lower paid field because you "have a passion for it" because money does count later on. Try having a wife and two young kids without enough money to make ends meet and tell me how happy you are with your sociology field.
Are you saying that liberal arts degrees somehow cost more than a degree out of a different college? "College" is used meaning "college of liberal arts" vs "college of health and human services" as an academic entitiy within a university.
Quote:
Originally Posted by NJBest
The problem with studying liberal arts is that people never finish their education. And then they have few job prospects. There's nothing wrong about liberal arts if you finish higher education.
If you don't finish college it doesn't matter whether you were "studying" liberal arts or engineering.
Last edited by toobusytoday; 10-08-2012 at 07:52 AM..
Reason: removed orphaned remark
At 18 young people think youth goes on forever and four years is light years away but we who are older know it is just the blink of an eye. We also understand it's complete rubbish to be in a lower paid field because you "have a passion for it" because money does count later on. Try having a wife and two young kids without enough money to make ends meet and tell me how happy you are with your sociology field.[/quote]
I really like your last statment for it is very true. Many 18 years old don't really have a conception of what the real world is like, what the job market is actually like. Instead its more of "Il go to college, major in whatever and find work at Prudential, or some local office type job, and oh its ok if my degree is not in accounting or business because I have a degree and that is enough". They do not know how hard it is to get that first job, that even the unpaid internships are no guarntee. They do not now that every accounting, grad, finance grad and business grad is competiting for that same "office type position" and that the employer will be more keen on hiring them over "generic liberal arts dude".
Your 18, your naive, you don't know yet.
In regards to passion, yes passion is important, you have to like or at least tolerate what you are doing. However passion alone is not enough at some point you need to be making money- doesn't mean you have to be reach but you need some form of income. If your major is Art lets say, and you are really pasionate about Art and you only want to work in a musuem or for the art department of a magazine and you are not willing to comprise or "settle" for any other type of work, then you will have a very hard time of it looking for work. What do you do when you can't find the musuem job, what if the magazine only brought on 2 interns?
Passion is great, but unfortunalty you can't go to Shop Rite and say: "Hey I'd like to purchase this milk, I don't have a job yet but I am really passionate about my English degree!" Car insurance is not going to ease up on the bill because " Oh its ok, we won't charge Joe this month he is still looking for his dream job in anthropolgy".
Passion has to be paired with common sense, a realstic expection after graduation. That does not mean everyone has to be nursing majors, engineering or accounting majors but there must be some thought into chosing what to study. I assure you there is nothing Romantic about being a starving artist and for every Seth Mcfarlne who found great success with his Bachelor in Fine Arts, there are many Fine Arts and Illustration grads struggling to find work.
At 18 young people think youth goes on forever and four years is light years away but we who are older know it is just the blink of an eye. We also understand it's complete rubbish to be in a lower paid field because you "have a passion for it" because money does count later on. Try having a wife and two young kids without enough money to make ends meet and tell me how happy you are with your sociology field.
You're assuming everybody wants a wife and two kids.
That said, that's the reason I don't like how college comes immediately after high school. I had zero idea what I wanted to do with my life at 17 (when I graduated HS). I'm 21 now and still am not quite sure although at least I know the general realm of what I'd like to do.
You're assuming everybody wants a wife and two kids.
That said, that's the reason I don't like how college comes immediately after high school. I had zero idea what I wanted to do with my life at 17 (when I graduated HS). I'm 21 now and still am not quite sure although at least I know the general realm of what I'd like to do.
Most Americans eventually do settle down and have a family (whether or not they marry). So, your first sentence is not a bad assumption to make if you replace "everybody" with "most people."
At 18 young people think youth goes on forever and four years is light years away but we who are older know it is just the blink of an eye. We also understand it's complete rubbish to be in a lower paid field because you "have a passion for it" because money does count later on. Try having a wife and two young kids without enough money to make ends meet and tell me how happy you are with your sociology field.
I don't think there is a single academic field (including sociology) where the top people in the field are not making six figures. At the same time, there are very few fields where the bottom 5% are earning more than $50k/year. Don't underestimate the financial value of passion. If your passion for the field will take you to the top of the field, you will be financial secure and far happier with your life than if you took a higher paid field that you would be unhappy with and underperform (possibly to the point where you have difficulty finding work or being financially secure).
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