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This is absurd. The idea that a university should teach you to think rather than teach you job skills isn't a new idea, it's the core principle of a traditional

This is absurd. The idea that a university should teach you to think rather than teach you job skills isn't a new idea, it's the core principle of a traditional liberal arts education. Visit virtually any liberal arts college in the US and you'll find a place where the professors value teaching critical thinking and communication skills. Typically there are small discussion based classes where participation is a portion of your grade, and lots of writing assignments. That said, according to the article there is one interesting innovation here. While traditional liberal arts schools value critical thinking over tangible skills, students still pick a major and working on a major within an academic department usually means being prepared for graduate school in that discipline. Instead this school tasks its students with creating something novel within their concentration, which is potentially a great way to compromise between the lofty ideals of a liberal arts education and the non-existent job market for academics. Instead of "learning to think" and being prepared for a fictional career in academia, you can learn to think and try to apply those critical thinking skills toward making a tangible impact on the world.

mc32 12y ago
There is another alternative college which I find interesting --it's pretty exclusive but seems to have quite a few salient people in its alumni. "Deep Springs is founded on three principles, commonly called the "three pillars": academics, labor, and self-government." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_Springs_College http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_Springs_College
- ForHackernews 12y ago
  I know a guy who went there. It's a weird place, and they spend a lot of their time playing cowboy.
  - mc32 12y ago
    I'm curious what he thinks about it? Good place, or it's good but only for some kind of people (right disposition), just different (not good or bad)? Any other tidbits?
    - ForHackernews 12y ago
      I think he liked it a lot, and credits it with making him who he is today. I think definitely it's a "right disposition" kind of place. For one thing, it's an all-male school, so you have to be a) a man, and b) the kind of man who doesn't mind not having women around. It's also a tiny, tiny school. I think they only take like a dozen students each year, so you have to be prepared to spend all your time with the same really small group of people.
      - mc32 12y ago
        Cool; thanks for the information. I suppose it's a pretty good college to go before university.
mindslight 12y ago
In theory, theory and practice are equivalent. In practice, theory and practice are quite different. My engineering and computer science classes taught me more about "how to think" than the liberal arts classes I took - those seemed to focus on regurgitating facts or the professor's viewpoint. And I certainly didn't get the impression that the in-major kids were doing anything different, just better practiced regurgitation. I think if "liberal arts" education were fulfilling its promise, it would have long ago adopted programming (an unforgiving applied logic) as a core component (scheme/haskell, not python). People in general learn by example, while teachers (having already learned) tend to emphasize abstract models. This is a great recipe for model precession, fostering an illusion of thinking critically while being at the mercy of now-invisible built in assumptions.
- ritchiea 12y ago
  That's funny because I don't think my computer science classes taught me much about programming (other than learning about deterministic finite automatons) or thinking and the best preparation I had for real world programming came from formal logic classes. Which were in the philosophy department.
  - mindslight 12y ago
    I'm certainly not saying my CS/EE classes were spot on in their approach, but they forced me to solve problems, which I think is a fundamental component of learning that is easy to ignore. I'm guessing your logic classes had similar problem solving where errors were objectively called out. I regrettably didn't take philosophy classes, but only softer things that were subjectively graded via essay. In retrospect, they seem like fine topics to have studied after one developed critical thinking skills, but when presented as competitors to hard logic they devolved into a subjective/memorization fest (I'd love to upvote you for friendly insightful discussion, but I appear to be unable to vote on comments. email to hn@ has so far gone unanswered)
- WalterBright 12y ago
  The thing about liberal arts is it teaches you to argue any point of view, right or wrong, with equal facility. With engineering, you cannot argue that the rocket didn't blow up. I.e. with engineering, reality is the check on the validity of your critical thinking. With liberal arts, there is no such check.
tedks 12y ago
>Visit virtually any liberal arts college in the US and you'll find a place where the professors value teaching critical thinking and communication skills. The difference between Minerva and this is that at Minerva, it seems like the focus is directly teaching those things, whereas at a liberal arts college you learn those things very indirectly and usually filtered through existing disciplines. My brother is a biochem major at a liberal arts college and all that means is that he has to do more presentations than he would have had he gone to the state research university I did. This is actually a dramatic shift from teaching concepts like analytical thinking, organization, communication, etc., indirectly via things like classics, philosophy, and other mostly-obsolete and practically useless things that are used as signalling for high wealth (ability to take classes that don't relate to a profession) and conscientiousness (ability to read a lot and write about it). That said, the "critical thinking" in liberal arts is a joke. What actually happens is that the professor presents several arguments for or against a topic, and you regurgitate this on a paper.
- ritchiea 12y ago
  Did you attend a liberal arts college? Because regurgitating the professor isn't at all what happened at the one I attended. Every student was required to do independent research. As for whether learning critical thinking in the liberal arts is a direct or indirect result, I like this quote from Reed College's dean of the faculty Peter Steinberger: "There’s only one thing that I think I can do, only one thing I’m qualified to do, and that’s help students learn how to think, to analyze, to develop intellectual discipline, to acquire a degree of mastery over one or another conceptual apparatus that helps us organize experience in compelling and defensible ways." [1] He is not alone among teachers of the liberal arts in believing that while they are compelled by their individual disciplines, they are ultimately teaching students to think. 1. http://www.reed.edu/reed_magazine/sallyportal/posts/2014/an-evening-with-deresiewicz.html http://www.reed.edu/reed_magazine/sallyportal/posts/2014/an-...
  - tedks 12y ago
    I didn't attend a liberal arts college, but that was my experience in the liberal arts classes I took. Independent research is irrelevant; the patterns of argument used are rarely novel. I don't disagree that liberal arts colleges say the things you claim, I just dispute that they do them. One is much harder than the other.
hackuser 12y ago
Also, to emphasize and expand on 'critical thinking', liberal arts teaches you to question ideas and assumptions, your own and others', to be open minded to and assimilate new concepts, and to communicate well. > Instead of "learning to think" and being prepared for a fictional career in academia This is overstated. I expect that the great majority of high-paying jobs are held by people with liberal arts degrees. The idea that they are worthless in the job market is a popular exaggeration, but wrong.
- ritchiea 12y ago
  I was not suggesting that liberal arts degrees are worthless, I have one. It's been extremely valuable. What I mean is: part of liberal arts education, especially at the most liberal artsy institutions (University of Chicago, Swarthmore, Reed, etc) is specifically training you the tools of an academic discipline. In its highest aims, the new university pitched in the article aims to keep the best of the liberal arts education (teaching you good thinking) and throw out the rot (teaching you a specific academic discipline).
  - hackuser 12y ago
    Sorry if I misunderstood you. > part of liberal arts education, especially at the most liberal artsy institutions (University of Chicago, Swarthmore, Reed, etc) is specifically training you the tools of an academic discipline Having no expertise in this area myself ... I agree that learning how to be a professional academic is not widely valuable. However, I suspect there is value in focusing on an academic discipline. The thinking required for academic disciplines -- especially in regard to creating new knowledge -- may differ from more practical ones, and learning something in depth differs from learning in more superficial breadth. It may not matter so much what you learn, as long as you study something in depth. Finally, it may prepare you well for graduate school, which is much more common than academic careers.

mc32 12y ago

There is another alternative college which I find interesting --it's pretty exclusive but seems to have quite a few salient people in its alumni. "Deep Springs is founded on three principles, commonly called the "three pillars": academics, labor, and self-government." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_Springs_College http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_Springs_College

ForHackernews 12y ago
I know a guy who went there. It's a weird place, and they spend a lot of their time playing cowboy.
- mc32 12y ago
  I'm curious what he thinks about it? Good place, or it's good but only for some kind of people (right disposition), just different (not good or bad)? Any other tidbits?
  - ForHackernews 12y ago
    I think he liked it a lot, and credits it with making him who he is today. I think definitely it's a "right disposition" kind of place. For one thing, it's an all-male school, so you have to be a) a man, and b) the kind of man who doesn't mind not having women around. It's also a tiny, tiny school. I think they only take like a dozen students each year, so you have to be prepared to spend all your time with the same really small group of people.
    - mc32 12y ago
      Cool; thanks for the information. I suppose it's a pretty good college to go before university.

mindslight 12y ago

In theory, theory and practice are equivalent. In practice, theory and practice are quite different. My engineering and computer science classes taught me more about "how to think" than the liberal arts classes I took - those seemed to focus on regurgitating facts or the professor's viewpoint. And I certainly didn't get the impression that the in-major kids were doing anything different, just better practiced regurgitation. I think if "liberal arts" education were fulfilling its promise, it would have long ago adopted programming (an unforgiving applied logic) as a core component (scheme/haskell, not python). People in general learn by example, while teachers (having already learned) tend to emphasize abstract models. This is a great recipe for model precession, fostering an illusion of thinking critically while being at the mercy of now-invisible built in assumptions.

ritchiea 12y ago
That's funny because I don't think my computer science classes taught me much about programming (other than learning about deterministic finite automatons) or thinking and the best preparation I had for real world programming came from formal logic classes. Which were in the philosophy department.
- mindslight 12y ago
  I'm certainly not saying my CS/EE classes were spot on in their approach, but they forced me to solve problems, which I think is a fundamental component of learning that is easy to ignore. I'm guessing your logic classes had similar problem solving where errors were objectively called out. I regrettably didn't take philosophy classes, but only softer things that were subjectively graded via essay. In retrospect, they seem like fine topics to have studied after one developed critical thinking skills, but when presented as competitors to hard logic they devolved into a subjective/memorization fest (I'd love to upvote you for friendly insightful discussion, but I appear to be unable to vote on comments. email to hn@ has so far gone unanswered)
WalterBright 12y ago
The thing about liberal arts is it teaches you to argue any point of view, right or wrong, with equal facility. With engineering, you cannot argue that the rocket didn't blow up. I.e. with engineering, reality is the check on the validity of your critical thinking. With liberal arts, there is no such check.

tedks 12y ago

>Visit virtually any liberal arts college in the US and you'll find a place where the professors value teaching critical thinking and communication skills. The difference between Minerva and this is that at Minerva, it seems like the focus is directly teaching those things, whereas at a liberal arts college you learn those things very indirectly and usually filtered through existing disciplines. My brother is a biochem major at a liberal arts college and all that means is that he has to do more presentations than he would have had he gone to the state research university I did. This is actually a dramatic shift from teaching concepts like analytical thinking, organization, communication, etc., indirectly via things like classics, philosophy, and other mostly-obsolete and practically useless things that are used as signalling for high wealth (ability to take classes that don't relate to a profession) and conscientiousness (ability to read a lot and write about it). That said, the "critical thinking" in liberal arts is a joke. What actually happens is that the professor presents several arguments for or against a topic, and you regurgitate this on a paper.

ritchiea 12y ago
Did you attend a liberal arts college? Because regurgitating the professor isn't at all what happened at the one I attended. Every student was required to do independent research. As for whether learning critical thinking in the liberal arts is a direct or indirect result, I like this quote from Reed College's dean of the faculty Peter Steinberger: "There’s only one thing that I think I can do, only one thing I’m qualified to do, and that’s help students learn how to think, to analyze, to develop intellectual discipline, to acquire a degree of mastery over one or another conceptual apparatus that helps us organize experience in compelling and defensible ways." [1] He is not alone among teachers of the liberal arts in believing that while they are compelled by their individual disciplines, they are ultimately teaching students to think. 1. http://www.reed.edu/reed_magazine/sallyportal/posts/2014/an-evening-with-deresiewicz.html http://www.reed.edu/reed_magazine/sallyportal/posts/2014/an-...
- tedks 12y ago
  I didn't attend a liberal arts college, but that was my experience in the liberal arts classes I took. Independent research is irrelevant; the patterns of argument used are rarely novel. I don't disagree that liberal arts colleges say the things you claim, I just dispute that they do them. One is much harder than the other.

hackuser 12y ago

Also, to emphasize and expand on 'critical thinking', liberal arts teaches you to question ideas and assumptions, your own and others', to be open minded to and assimilate new concepts, and to communicate well. > Instead of "learning to think" and being prepared for a fictional career in academia This is overstated. I expect that the great majority of high-paying jobs are held by people with liberal arts degrees. The idea that they are worthless in the job market is a popular exaggeration, but wrong.

ritchiea 12y ago
I was not suggesting that liberal arts degrees are worthless, I have one. It's been extremely valuable. What I mean is: part of liberal arts education, especially at the most liberal artsy institutions (University of Chicago, Swarthmore, Reed, etc) is specifically training you the tools of an academic discipline. In its highest aims, the new university pitched in the article aims to keep the best of the liberal arts education (teaching you good thinking) and throw out the rot (teaching you a specific academic discipline).
- hackuser 12y ago
  Sorry if I misunderstood you. > part of liberal arts education, especially at the most liberal artsy institutions (University of Chicago, Swarthmore, Reed, etc) is specifically training you the tools of an academic discipline Having no expertise in this area myself ... I agree that learning how to be a professional academic is not widely valuable. However, I suspect there is value in focusing on an academic discipline. The thinking required for academic disciplines -- especially in regard to creating new knowledge -- may differ from more practical ones, and learning something in depth differs from learning in more superficial breadth. It may not matter so much what you learn, as long as you study something in depth. Finally, it may prepare you well for graduate school, which is much more common than academic careers.