View of Liberal Arts degree?

[Pumpkin354]

Hi, I've always understood that Liberal arts degrees are not as well respected as a pure humanities or social science degree, but it seems to be the way forward nowadays if you want to mix humanities and social sciences with a bit of language (without having to do language 50% or only history/politics for example).

A number of the top universities seem to offer some variation now - UCL does ESPS and arts & sciences BSAC, Durham does a combined social science or a liberal arts, Bristol offers liberal arts etc.

Any opinions? thanks

Mathsanxiety, Too expensive for the student, but for the state. The US has a lot of private universities, the UK does not. Increasing the length of a standard degree from three years to four would wreck havoc with the higher education budget.

Both systems have their advantages and disadvantages. Lack of specialisation can hold US grads back as they aim to progress to higher degrees. And it appears that even at top US Universities, Liberal Arts do not always help students develop independent analytical skills. There is a lot of group think going on.

DS is currently a second year LANS student at Birmingham. Loves his course. It is as flexible as the website implies - contact hours vary depending on the subjects chosen. DS says if she majors in Chemistry she is likely to have roughly 15 to 20 hours a week. It also offers the possiblity of converting to single honours or dual honours if that's what she eventually decides she wants to do. Students can take as broad or as narrow a subject choice as they like - One thing to bear in mind is that with LANS you won't be tied to a particular department - she'd do Chemistry in the chemistry dept, history with the historians and Spanish in modern languages so you need to be fairly autonomous and independent. However a big benefit is that LANS is its own School within the uni and because it's smaller than say Engineering, Social Sciences, Medicine etc you get to know all the well-being and support staff very well so it's quite nurturing in that respect. There's also a variety of staff you can talk to about orientation so she's bound to find someone who will "get" her. In DS's words: "she won't just be stuck with a load of chemistry nerds or a load of airy-fairy philosophers". What has also been interesting for him is working on projects with other LANS students across different disciplines - summed up rather brilliantly by @mathanxiety It offers the skills and concepts to work across several disciplines - qualitative and quantitative methods, mathematical thinking, language arts, for instance. It makes you a very versatile thinker, able to incorporate methodology, concepts, material, and skills from across a wide range of disciplines, in the workplace, so it makes you a very appealing prospect to employers and graduate schools in many different disciplines. Reading the description of your DD, DS says she sounds like the perfect candidate for LANS - good to have an idea about what you want to study with the option to veer off from that (rather than just picking it because you don't know what you want to do).

Isn’t liberal arts mostly chosen here because students don’t know what to do? I think the same applies to general engineering. The vast majority do make a choice. A minority struggle with that.

No, they do it because they are often very talented in lots of different areas.

Sounds like you've been drinking the Kool-Aid 😂 Very talented in lots of different areas except decision making perhaps.

I'm being totally serious. The most recent teen I know that studies Liberal Arts got four A*s in languages, humanities and maths. Spanish, History, RS and Maths. He can specialise at Masters level if he wishes.

One of my DC took an interest in the Birmingham LANS course. They liked the fact the department try to build connections within the LANS student body through term time and vacation activities; this was in recognition that, by definition, LANS students are all pursuing different module combinations from the outset.

Other existing Liberal Arts degree courses may offer the same but I can imagine that if Liberal Arts were to be offered more widely, some unis might be tempted to cut corners with that aspect.

I get the sense that Liberal Arts, and Natural Science, courses really come into their own for those students actively exploring the boundary between certain 'core' subjects; these may lead to niche employment or academic opportunities.

For those drawn to Liberal Arts, or Natural Sciences, because they are undecided about the next stage of specialisation, the benefits might not be as clear cut. Post-course employability stats for such courses are often based on very low sample sizes, but a quick scan suggests there is no special uplift. I appreciate that is not the only metric by which to judge a course, but is a factor.

I can imagine personal timetables straddling several faculties require students to be especially good at time management and that, probably more than course breadth etc, is a factor that potential employers should consider in a very positive light if coming across a Liberal Arts graduate.

@Pumpkin354 Durham liberal arts is unbelievably competitive even when predicted 3a stars there's no guarantee of an offer.
I do agree that some (not all) liberal arts students chose it because hey dint know what they want to do and it keeps options wide open. But if you are like my dd and so talented in many areas, it allows some exploration before specialising in a certain area.
Some places such as Bristol have the option of a masters in liberal arts

I agree with @PerpetualOptimist that they need to be very organised and good at time keeping. Not following the crowd and fitting in with other courses is part of it.

It's a good degree if you don't really know what you want to study and aren't heading to a career that requires a specific subject but the advice dd was given was that a language as part of the mix adds legitimacy to those employers who don't get it.

I didn't see @TizerorFizz's post as a negative comment – there's nothing wrong with not knowing what career path you want to follow at 17. Some people do, others don't.

It makes perfect sense to me to keep options open if you don't know for certain that you want to be, say, a doctor, or a lawyer. A Liberal Arts degree sounds great, as long as it's rigorous, which I'm assuming at the likes of Durham or Birmingham, it will be. Not so sure about a Liberal Arts masters – would be interested to know what line of work students go into from there. If I was interviewing someone with a Liberal Arts BA and a Liberal Arts MA, I think my first question might be 'haven't you decided what you want to do yet?' 😂

The current state-supported model for UK universities is not sustainable. There are only a few British universities with endowments, and these and others that develop a long term plan for financial self-sufficiency are the only ones whose long term survival as third level institutions I would be willing to bet on.

I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that there's a lack of specialisation in US undergrad degrees?
Or the idea that 'independent analytical skills' are a thing, or that analytical skills (if that's what you meant) are not developed in leading US universities.

Progressing to a postgrad degree isn't always necessary in the US, where graduates of reasonably well-regarded universities can make very good starting salaries straight out of university thanks to the range of skills learned at undergrad level. Adding to the debt burden you may already be carrying isn't always a good idea if you manage to establish yourself on a career track, or even get a decent job, right out of university. One of my DDs might yet go back to school to get a masters in finance, but she's making a nice salary where she is so there's no pressure. Another considered an MBA but again, she's doing well without it.

Professional level postgrad degrees remain as popular as ever - law, medicine, pharmacy, veterinary medicine, dentistry - and there are always people going on to do an MBA regardless of academic background, because they have enough mathematics/ comp science/ stats courses under their belts to facilitate this. Applicants to law schools come from a huge variety of academic backgrounds, but there's nothing to stop liberal arts and sciences grads who focus on the arts or humanities from deciding to pursue something like medicine either. One of DD3's friends has a degree in philosophy and is currently in med school with hopes of becoming an OB/Gyn eventually.

Obv someone doing a masters in something like psychology or a L/MCSW qualification would probably have done psych at undergrad level, or at least enough psych courses to provide a solid foundation. There are masters level courses in areas like public health that attract applicants from a wide variety of undergrad majors. Same goes for library and archival science at masters level, human resources, etc. A masters in education will get you into teaching or high school counseling if you decided not to do a Bachelors in education/ counseling. Masters programmes that demonstrably lead to career tracks are not lacking for applicants. The cost benefit calculation comes down squarely on the benefit side here.

I get the impression that in the USA students don’t mind studying for a degree and then another degree for a qualification. We just on with it a bit quicker. We don’t need a myriad of degrees for most professions. So most doctors start wanting to be doctors. Engineers train as engineers after their engineering degree. There’s no huge advantage doing liberal arts first. Other than racking up costs which keeps the universities afloat .

That would be an incorrect impression. Most American grads don't do a postgrad degree. They are employed upon graduation.

Most grads who go on to do medicine have had at least the seed of the idea from high school on. Med schools want to see your high school transcript as part of the application process. You'd better have an excellent GPA and evidence of courses taken at the highest level. They also want to see your undergrad transcript, and will look for grades, courses taken, etc. Most students know that doing medicine (or veterinary medicine, or dentistry) means putting your ears back and working really hard from age 14 on. Prep for medicine and veterinary medicine also involves getting experience in media settings as a volunteer or on some sort of programme. DS volunteered in a local hospital as a weekend porter after getting through a series of interviews.

It's not a case of not knowing what you want to do for the rest of your life at age 17 either - though why this is considered a positive escapes me - most people are aware of where their general interests and talents lie. Some get interested in a subject as they grow into adulthood and their intellect develops in university. Forcing a choice that will impact the rest of their lives on teenagers isn't really for the best imo, and in the UK this choice must be made earlier than almost anywhere else.

You start out in engineering in the US too. Obv you do core coursework in key topics in maths and science to begin with before sinking your teeth into your chisen specialty. But you are also required to do other core coursework in most well-regarded engineering schools because the concept of education includes training in the ability to communicate effectively in English and maybe another language, relate to people who are not engineers, and perhaps move abroad to work, or work effectively alongside non engineers. A local university requires 24 credits in six subject areas outside of the degree requirements of any particular school, including the engineering school. One of the areas is creative arts.

The huge advantage of liberal arts is the wide range of skills you bring to a potential employer. Most employers are sincerely not interested in the topic you wrote your honours history thesis on but they might be very interested in the programme you had to write in order to quantify your findings on literacy in Rouen in the 1750s. If you weren't confident in your ability to tackle a project like that because of leaving mathematics and all its works and promises behind at age 16, you might have avoided a project or topic that required STEM skills. Dropping STEM is limiting.

I was told by a former graduate of the UCL BASc that students can feel as though they are drifting on the fringes of the different departments of specialist degrees academically and socially. Even for a major subject module choice and level will be restricted due to time on the subject and timetabling. The principle of maintaining breadth and having interdisciplinary skills is great but I prefer something like the Imperial Horizon”s structure ie a fixed cross-disciplinary timetable slot for all students.

@mathanxiety
Stem students earn more. That’s true. Careers are not necessarily limited by lack of maths at degree level. Plenty don’t require it. I have frequently said on MN that what you study on an arts degree has less importance than what skills you learn. However scattergun learning isn’t necessarily great. If someone is clever they usually have a career in mind. They need to work out the best way to get it.

I'm afraid you are still applying American structures to British unverisities @mathanxiety. As stated in a previous post, our education systems are different – whether one is better than the other is a subjective opinion, but the fact is they are set up differently, to suit all levels of education within their own country.

For example, you wouldn't get onto a Public Health Masters in the UK with a degree in Liberal Arts. You have to have done your first degree in a related subject. This means medicine, health or health sciences. So your statement: There are masters level courses in areas like public health that attract applicants from a wide variety of undergrad majors would not be true in the UK. The amount of science you get from a Liberal Arts degree would not be sufficient to meet this qualification standard. If you knew you wanted to get into public health, you'd have to start down a different route.

You can't transfer to medicine in the UK. You can apply to medical school after a first degree in a completely unrelated subject, but then why spend 3 years studying an unrelated subject if you know you want to be a doctor? You would also likely have to answer that question at your Medical School interview too, and convince them that you were now committed to medicine.

UK universities want students to have a passion for their subject, a deep and abiding interest in studying it for 3 (or 4) years. The end. They don't care about your extracurriculars, your outside interests or really anything much apart from being dedicated to the study of that one (or 2) subject(s). I appreciate this approach might be alien to someone in the US, but that's what UK universities are looking for.

Liberal Arts is not Stem. Here the skills won’t be hugely different from a humanities or MFL grad. Obviously some courses have some science/maths built in but they won’t compare with a maths degree or stem degree. I do have some sympathy with maths being taught after 16 but this should be business maths that’s actuality useful! I appreciate finding the teachers is a nightmare. Stem students need English too. DH fed up with correcting the English of qualified engineers in reports!

Oh, whilst I agree with nearly all of that, that's not quite true about public health. There are people in public health with degrees and postgrad degrees in social policy and sociology. The sociology of health is a specific field within public health.

@thing47 said related degrees for a masters in public health. @Piggywaspushed The degrees you quote are related. They are not Liberal Arts.

Yes thanks @TizerorFizz. I'm sure there are people working in public health with a whole range of qualifications and backgrounds.

What I was specifically addressing was @mathanxiety's point that in the US you can get onto a public health Masters course with a range of undergraduate degrees. That is not the case in the UK, where you have to have done a health-related first degree. Liberal Arts, for all its virtues, would not qualify.

So, yes, actually @Piggywaspushed what I wrote is true. Your point is a different one from mine.

I think also that USA university courses developed along differing lines. The first universities in Europe were in Italy and gave us bachelor degrees. We developed those in our own style with our ancient universities where Americans studied. It’s inevitable that systems differ. We tend to be subject focussed earlier. I do think students should have wider skills but if you look at MN, posters DC cannot wait to give up MFL snd even at university look for the easiest degree. We don’t like breadth! We like success even if it’s narrow.

Well, OK, certainly don't want a fight but you said you needed STEM and there would not be enough sciences in a Lib Arts degree so I leapt to the defence of social sciences...