Advantages of a Liberal Arts Education

As I mentioned in my initial post for this blog, I attend Loras College in Dubuque, IA. Loras is a four year liberal arts college. When I arrived at Loras College in the fall of 2005, I had very little idea about what it meant for the school to be classified as a liberal arts college. After over three years of attending Loras, I feel as though I have a clear idea about what it means to graduate from a liberal arts college. An institution that promotes a liberal arts education is focused on providing students with well-rounded knowledge. Large universities and trade schools often allow students to focus on only one discipline without taking courses in other areas. Liberal arts institutions allow students to broaden their horizons and take classes that will also help them in their areas of interest. I believe that the most common areas that the liberal arts focus on are the humanities and social sciences. These areas of studies promote the understanding of people and their history which is vital for any area of study.

The liberal arts are also important to the world outside of college. When many people enter the workforce and remain in the same position for many years they tend to lose knowledge about other things. People become experts in a small field while forgetting about others. A liberal arts perspective would say that it would be essential to maintain knowledge about general topics in addition to focusing on a given field. This would allow people to have commonalities with a large portion of the population and would also help them in their career or personally. Many people that have the ability to talk about a wide range of topics can relate well to others and are more likely to advance in their careers than someone who is so focused on a specific topic that they are unable to effectively communicate. Having a large background in general areas of interest also can add an outside perspective to ideas and help in assessing their feasibility or effectiveness.

Martha Nussbaum’s book; Cultivating Humanity, promotes the use of a liberal arts education in colleges today. Nussbaum bases nearly all of her arguments on the teachings of Socrates and his views on education. She believes that it is important for a liberal arts view on the world even outside of a college setting. “We have not produced truly free citizens in the Socratic sense unless we have produced people who can reason for themselves and argue well, who understand the difference between a logically valid and a logically invalid argument, who can distinguish between the logical form of an argument and the truth of its premises” (Nussbaum 35). This evidence shows that Nussbaum believes that for a person to be able to succeed in the world they must be able to understand concepts that are taught through a liberal arts education. Nussbaum argues that the most important concept that can be drawn from a liberal arts education and used in the world is logical analysis. This argument is based on the need to question life and not blindly follow instructions or advice that may not be in a person’s best interests. This holds true in the classroom setting where Nussbaum promotes the idea that students should constantly be questioning professors and never accept what they say as always being the truth.

Nussbaum admits that there are challenges to this Socratic way of teaching that she strongly promotes. She argues that there are two challenges to this promotion of student questioning. One is the conservative opposition. “This argument suspects that Socrates’ dedication to argument will subvert traditional values” (Nussbaum 37). People that make this argument would be in favor of a system where students don’t question professors. Often times these types of people are involved in religious affairs where questioning is often frowned upon. The second challenge comes from people who believe that not everyone is capable of logical thinking. This often includes women and minorities. Nussbaum believes that anyone is capable of logical thinking and can excel in the Socratic Method.

How does all of this talk on liberal arts and Socratic teaching connect to the service learning that I will be performing? I believe that a solid background in courses of the humanities and the social sciences will allow me to better connect to people. Learning about the people of the past and how they thought and interacted will allow me to understand what the needs of people that I will be helping are today. People have had the same basic needs throughout known history and by learning about those needs at a liberal arts college I will be able to apply what I have learned in my service works.