The most wretched nonmonetary consequence of our nation's economic distress over the past two years, in my view, is an acceleration of our country's loss of values. No, I am not referring to coded political messages about "family values." I mean values as related to language, literature, culture, and ethics, to the very breadth of knowledge that helps us understand ourselves and what it means to be human -- in good times and bad.
Yes, I am talking about the humanities. But before you groan at yet another university president seeking to feed at the public trough by proclaiming the value of a liberal education, let's get serious about what our nation needs. To be sure, jobs, regional economic development, and careful control of expenditures in the public and private sectors are keys to a robust recovery. But we got where we are in part through a loss of values, a lack of understanding of the lessons of history and, increasingly, a loss of civility and of the sense of fair play. Witness, for example, the nastiness of the recent midterm elections, which demonstrated our collective loss of the ability - or even the desire -- to understand and respect each other. I would echo James Leach, chair of the National Endowment for the Humanities and former U.S. Representative: "The temper and integrity of the political dialogue are more important for the cohesiveness of society than the outcome of any election."
Do we want our children to find better and more effective ways to understand their world and work with each other to improve it? Of course. Then we better think twice about the education they should receive.
Course work in the humanities is often promoted, legitimately, as a way to teach basic skills of contextual thinking, communication and ethics to scientists, engineers, businesspeople and others. But we must also recognize the value of the humanities as a discipline of research and critical analysis in its own right. The past cannot be changed, but our knowledge of it can be enhanced through rigorous study. As we have learned the hard way in Iraq and Afghanistan, if we want to "win the hearts and minds" of those in the line of fire in war-riven areas of our world, we must understand their histories and their cultures, languages, religions, and values.
All of us, and especially policymakers in Washington, need to recognize that the risk of losing the underlying disciplines that make these understandings possible is real. Students are voting with their feet by choosing courses in "practical" fields that they think will yield employment. They are often wrong, but who can blame them? As the number of bachelor's degrees in the humanities as a percentage of all degrees has declined (from a high of nearly 18% in 1967 to about 8% in 2007), so has the funding for these fields.
Democrats and Republicans in Washington fail to recognize that we are steadily divesting from support of the humanities and the arts. To wit, the NEH and the National Endowment for the Arts have been tempting targets for those seeking to advance particular political, social or religious agendas or to show fiscal restraint; since 1994 their budgets have dropped by more than a third in inflation-adjusted dollars.
The amount of funding needed to turn this around, let me emphasize, is modest. While our government now operates in large part under a Continuing Resolution (a legislative procedure that funds a new fiscal year at the same level as the last while appropriations decisions are considered), the NEH budget is pegged at $167.5 million, with the President's budget suggesting a cut to about $161 million (hardly a rounding error in comparison to the more than $30-billion budget of the National Institutes of Health). If the trends continue, it is not hyperbolic to suggest that these critical areas of study may reach a tipping point and go into an irreversible decline. We need to appreciate and communicate to the country the important role that the humanities play in our national life.
Of course, as a physician and biomedical researcher, I firmly believe in the power of science and technology to advance knowledge and to improve our lives and the economy. But make no mistake: the most significant problems in our country and world will not be solved by science alone. We need aware and educated people and approaches to act upon that knowledge, recognizing its power as well as its limitations.
How can we reach the future to which we aspire without a broad educational curriculum and research portfolio that give vitality to our laws, ethics and cultural values? And how can we divest ourselves of the humanities at a time when our economic, political and military struggles increasingly underscore the costs of ignoring history, literature, languages, and philosophy?
Despite -- and perhaps because of -- stark budget realities we must have the political will and discipline to stabilize and, yes, increase investments in state and federal agencies, such as the NEH, that support the humanities. It's good for our children, it's good for our security, it's good for America.
It's not so important what we learn, but why we learn. Once we see why learning is important we can find where to learn. Maybe our nations universities aren't always the best places to go.
In a very short few years, only the rich and politically connected will be able to afford the luxury of Advanced Education.
-AJB
What the American party will begin in 2013 are changes that allow the growth of education determined by the ability of the student not by age or other factors. From first threw sixth grade students will be taught at the level they are not by the level the school uses in that grade. This will require the retired teachers and many educated parents to be in school a hour or more every day working with no more then three students mentoring them. This is for those that need help and those that are advancing as fast as they can grab a book. The propose of this is a real no child left behind because it will allow the education of all children at the pace they can handle with out more teachers.
There are other needs that should be addressed and the American party will address them. But for not that change would make the greatest change in the American public education system.
Our societal/cultural problem - how to get people to listen to what they NEED, but
don't want to hear?
George Orwell, 1984.
'nuff said on why what you very rightly propose will not happen, because that's not the type of Man the New World wants to build.
In any case, there are plenty of sources outside of college and unfunded by the NEH for people interested in arts and humanities to get their fill.
Maybe that's what you did. But the government shouldn't be pressuring or forcing schools into offering programs their students don't want or using taxpayer dollars to fund arts and humanities against the will of a lot of taxpayers.
the proper study of mankind is man."
Alexander Pope's "Essay on Man"
You can't buy thinking and pointing a gun at someone's head and threatening their survival is unethical. Free public education needs to produce a healthy survival or our society has failed to prepare youth. If you want to give people the opportunity to explore thought, communication and culture; it needs to be separated from survival.
She's a lot more academic than you'd think.
http://gagajournal.blogspot.com/ - Blog devoted to academic essays and works of art inspired by GaGa.
The Republicans don't. Don't believe me. Just listen to them!
All of that vitriol is done entirely by intent.
Read "Broken Government' by John Dean. His conclusions about motive and action may or may not be accurate, but they surely fit the behavior we see daily.
Educating our kids in the humanities is important. Educating our kids to use critical thinking skills so they don't get duped by outrageous lying is more important.
By the way, you'd better circle the wagons, because, if the Republicans get even more power, you can expect them to do everything they can to infect the university-level education in this country with their right wing disease. They have been screaming about how the universities are filled with liberals and socialist for years. If they control the purse strings....
What's funny about that, you know, is what the, ahem, right wing leaders in Germany did to the scientific community in their universities in the 1930's. In a somewhat simplistic observation about results, they got second-rate science and we got the bomb. When our own right wingnuts trash our universities, I expect the good research will simply be done elsewhere...China, Japan, India, etc.
The Left/Right diatribe has begun to resemble an 80's Pee Wee Herman skit.
FYI,huff reader, it's no mystery. University intellectual history is skewed far left, and has been for some time. Logic informs us bias is not "intellectual". Furthermore, it only forces conservative students toward private college venues of their own, also biased. This is intelligent? Democrats cause segregation.
How does your University promote humanities to new students? Do all freshman have the opportunity to study humanities or does your university, like many, demand extra effort on the part of the student to veer off the "engineering path"? Ideally, it should be the university who promotes humanities- the beauty of learning should be palpable. Students more often than not, do not really know what they want to study. It's the age old problem, are we expecting too much to occur in 4 years? The cost is already prohibitive, unfortunately students can not spare the time to just "study" for learning's sake.
If the collective "we" wants students to choose to study humanities, it is the responsibility of the University to give them the experience. We want our kids to love veggies, so we present them in the most delicious way possible and they grow up loving spinach. Do you offer freshman your best humanities courses taught by the best professors?
Mr. Skorton, you are on the front lines, you have the power to stand out among others or remain concerned with the old system, ranking, etc..
Are most freshman courses geered toward success or failure?
Are the professors teaching large classes interested in conveying knowledge or weeding out the pack?
Are your "engineers" offered a chance to know other disciplines or are they stuck on one path.
How do you offer humanities to students?
Kids steer clear of engineering and sciences (except for pre-med), because they are hard, and classes actually require real work, with weekly problem sets and so forth, while on the humanities side, you typically get a mid-term and final, or a paper and final, or just a paper, or just a final. A Physics professor acquaintance of mine recently was moaning about how he hasn't found a qualified American grad student in Physics for a couple of decades. All foreign...
Who wants to actually WORK on math problems or engineering design problems, when you can sign up for a class, blow off the whole semester, then whip out a paper in the last couple of days of a semester, then off to the holidays...or the beach? Especially if you can major in English, minor in Economics and become an investment banker, making those big bucks!
My point was a specific one, which was that when students are interested in the sciences/engineering they are on such a narrow track that it prohibits any studies of humanities which ultimately could serve to broaden their outlook as they head out to the working world. There are kids who want to work even amidst the multitudes of those you are describing....especially at the schools that have high name recognition like Cornell.
Kids are not steering clear of engineering and sciences, not at Cornell, they aren't ....those programs are weeding kids out left and right. Those programs are skewed to favor the often narrow mindset of students who have ONLY focused on math/science and yes many are foreign. The study of humanities can be a big benefit to students who actually spend too much time on problem sets.