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Humanities is also valuable - history, economics, traditional liberal arts are all valuable knowledge. I have one of each (B.Sc / B.A.) and a lot of the stuff I

Humanities is also valuable - history, economics, traditional liberal arts are all valuable knowledge. I have one of each (B.Sc / B.A.) and a lot of the stuff I learnt in the BA is very useful, for one thing it gives you the skills to argue with politicians who are, in the main, lawyers and professional arguers. As others in this thread have said, this will reserve humanities degrees for those that can afford them, i.e. the rich, who will become the lawyers and managers. Many managers have humanities degrees. And on a lighter note, where will our baristas come from if there's no arts graduates? It would be a poor society that doesn't have people educated in the arts.

pb7 6y ago
Humanities won’t go away. At some point, equilibrium will be reached and there will be an appropriate number of people going into each. Only the foolish think that liberal arts are completely worthless — but there are too many people that go into them with no special talent to give them an edge in a very limited employment market. I know from experience how common it is for people to decide to go to college because that’s the thing to do, and oh, well I guess I have to decide on a field to proceed with this so might as well choose something that my friends are doing. The thinking is backwards. First you have to decide what you want to do in life, calculate how that will provide for you financially, then figure out what education you need to get there. Who knows, maybe there is in fact a B.A. in Gender Studies requirement at my local coffee shop I don’t know about. ;)
- chadcmulligan 6y ago
  Sure, but, in general, the people doing a BA in gender studies probably won't make a great addition to the STEM workforce, but the BA will teach them other valuable skills, and they'll end up in teaching or management or something. To exclude these people from an education is short sighted in my opinion, the more educated people we have the better.
  - pb7 6y ago
    >the people doing a BA in gender studies probably won't make a great addition to the STEM workforce You never know. They do keep demanding diversity. Diversity of thought might be just the thing.
    - chadcmulligan 6y ago
      I think you've made my point - BA's in things you may not think of may end up being useful, why exclude them?
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
      - pb7 6y ago
        I think we’re in general agreement. But we already have BAs, presumably mostly folks that are naturally more geared towards that. And they’re not great for designing planes. So I’m proposing bringing the next generation of those same types of people, but to pursue engineering instead. You still need the technical education to do the work but perhaps it should be more than kids that grew up with Legos is what I’m saying.
        chadcmulligan 6y ago
        Yah, maybe, this is part of a big picture that I've been thinking about lately - is the economy there to serve people, or are the people there to serve the economy. The libs want the dial set very much to the people serve the economy, and they're taking advantage of the current situation to make it so. I'm more an economy is there to serve the people, so let's make things so that people have a good life, and figure out how we can do this.

pb7 6y ago

Humanities won’t go away. At some point, equilibrium will be reached and there will be an appropriate number of people going into each. Only the foolish think that liberal arts are completely worthless — but there are too many people that go into them with no special talent to give them an edge in a very limited employment market. I know from experience how common it is for people to decide to go to college because that’s the thing to do, and oh, well I guess I have to decide on a field to proceed with this so might as well choose something that my friends are doing. The thinking is backwards. First you have to decide what you want to do in life, calculate how that will provide for you financially, then figure out what education you need to get there. Who knows, maybe there is in fact a B.A. in Gender Studies requirement at my local coffee shop I don’t know about. ;)

chadcmulligan 6y ago
Sure, but, in general, the people doing a BA in gender studies probably won't make a great addition to the STEM workforce, but the BA will teach them other valuable skills, and they'll end up in teaching or management or something. To exclude these people from an education is short sighted in my opinion, the more educated people we have the better.
- pb7 6y ago
  >the people doing a BA in gender studies probably won't make a great addition to the STEM workforce You never know. They do keep demanding diversity. Diversity of thought might be just the thing.
  - chadcmulligan 6y ago
    I think you've made my point - BA's in things you may not think of may end up being useful, why exclude them?
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    - pb7 6y ago
      I think we’re in general agreement. But we already have BAs, presumably mostly folks that are naturally more geared towards that. And they’re not great for designing planes. So I’m proposing bringing the next generation of those same types of people, but to pursue engineering instead. You still need the technical education to do the work but perhaps it should be more than kids that grew up with Legos is what I’m saying.
      - chadcmulligan 6y ago
        Yah, maybe, this is part of a big picture that I've been thinking about lately - is the economy there to serve people, or are the people there to serve the economy. The libs want the dial set very much to the people serve the economy, and they're taking advantage of the current situation to make it so. I'm more an economy is there to serve the people, so let's make things so that people have a good life, and figure out how we can do this.