Why the Liberal Arts?

The Purpose of College

Many students today attend college to improve their chances of getting a good job and living a comfortable life after graduation. College indeed should broaden students’ opportunities for interesting, fulfilling careers.

Higher Education, Higher Calling

Higher education must do more than train students for a job. It should prepare them to be good citizens and community leaders. It should help them write, speak, think, and listen well; teach them to appreciate beauty created by humans and nature; and enable them to weigh evidence and separate truth from lies. The time spent at university should make a better colleague, a better parent, and a better person.

Liberal Arts, for Free People

The word “liberal” in the phrase “liberal arts” does not refer to a political ideology or a set of policy goals. Rather, it refers to the knowledge possessed by a free, self-governing person. The seven subject areas recommended by What Will They Learn?® represent a basic course of study needed to educate free people in the 21st century—Composition, Literature, Foreign Language, U.S. Government or History, Economics, Mathematics, and Natural Science. With the knowledge and skills gained in such courses, students can set their own course in life, contributing to their communities in innumerable ways. Lacking such an education leaves someone with an incomplete knowledge of the world.

The Best Solution

Of course, economic issues like getting a good job still matter quite a lot. The liberal arts are in fact the best solution to many practical economic problems. Rather than focusing narrowly on a chosen field of concentration, students who have completed a strong core curriculum in the liberal arts are prepared for many kinds of work and more capable of adapting to technological change than those who lack this breadth. Employers, in survey after survey, say they seek strong and independent thinkers, writers, and speakers, with a wealth of knowledge and the ability to learn on the spot: the exact skills cultivated by a rigorous liberal arts curriculum.

Yet the liberal arts offer much more—and What Will They Learn?® encourages students to study at institutions that take them seriously. Indeed, the seven subjects that comprise our grading system make up the core of the liberal arts, a course of study that goes back millennia and which has always had the goal of supporting students in their journey to becoming independent, happy, and productive citizens. There are other liberal arts subjects of great importance—including philosophy, religion, fine arts, world history, and Western civilization.

We encourage you to explore the following reports published by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni to learn more about the enduring value and contemporary importance of the liberal arts.

No U.S. History?: How College History Departments Leave the United States out of the Major

The Unkindest Cut: Shakespeare in Exile 2015

10 Things Everyone Should Know About American History