On the future of liberal arts departments in universities, et al...

Quite recently, there were a few articles and reports, all of which point to attempts to re-think the future of liberal arts like the future of department for French, and even the tenure of professors. The writing is all over the wall. That, in this season of budget squeeze and belt-tightening everywhere, schools can't afford to pay for everything. In short, something has to give. With its salary prospect being so much lower than practical subjects like Computer Science, and the ensuing dwindling student enrollment, liberal arts programs are the one of those whose existence is hardest to justify. The same goes with the rewriting of tenured professorship, which goes against the rationale of paying performance with rewards. Given a tenure at hand already, it's not hard to imagine how that would provide for a highly prized lifetime meal ticket that doesn't require much work for. For those of us who work in the private sectors when you have to work hard, year on year, just to stay in the game, the idea of a tenure is quite unjust and almost obscene.

To be honest, I never find the idea of tenure (be it professors or teachers) appetizing. Afterall, why is academia so different from the rest of the world anyways? Are these group of people really doing something so differently, and the work being so different, that they have to be treated on a completely different parallel universe? I don't think so.

On the other hand, just the idea of eliminating liberal arts program saddens me. It's true that salary and job prospects of straight liberal arts students have never been very good, never mind that it's much worse now, in this recession season. Over the lifetime of the students, that salary/job gap of liberal arts versus practical science majors grow ever more wider. But, does it really mean that we, as a society, can and should do without liberal arts, like history, language and art? I would consider it very, very short term vision, for anyone to even propose the idea that we can do without it. Afterall, that's part of our civilization, without the foundation of which, we will never grow, not to mention thrive.

Asians are mostly practical people. You would rarely find any college or university in Asia that stands out with its liberal arts faculty, like, say, what you would find in University of Chicago. Granted that Asia is on the up and up these days, and everyone raves about how many science graduates they're churning out every year from their universities, but I can tell you that, alot of Asians look to the west with admiration, in part because of the diversity in their programs that one can never find in any university in Asia. For anyone to even suggest that our universities should emulate what is practiced in the east, simply because their economy is on its upswing, just goes to show how short-sighted that statement is.