Is It Worth The Investment? Posted on April 3rd, 2012 by

 

It all began with a worthwhile question: What are you going to major in?

Looking back on the beginning of my career at Gustavus, I feel like my answer was different every time I had the conversation. And I’m sure that I am not the only one. I’ve spent time wandering all over the academic catalog. I explored, and eventually dropped, a Communication Studies major, a Sociology/Anthropology major, a Music, Business, and Peace Studies minor. I’ve withdrawn from classes that just didn’t seem to fit at the time, anxiously visited advisers about what classes to schedule for my next semester. And to be honest, I paid a lot of money hoping to figure out what I want to study! After all of this wandering, is the time at a liberal arts college worth the investment?

The question is certainly being asked these days. Type it in to google and you’ll come up with a rich online dialogue on the topic. Student loans are a heavy load, many people with college degrees are out of work and the job market for fresh graduates is not exactly inviting. Then there are the shining examples like Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg who have found tremendous success in technology with the absence of an undergraduate degree.

It’s not like I will walk out of Gustavus empty handed. I did eventually declare an individualized major, a fantastic option here. I am studying Global Community Development, exploring the ways that communities support social change. After I leave in a few months, I will carry a number of tools in my belt thanks to incredible professors, friends, and mentors. I’ve already been trained to collaborate with others, put a critical eye to articles and books, analyze a rhetorical argument and information in the media, ask reflective questions, write a paper, post a blog, but these only brush the surface of my education.

Michael Roth is the President at Wesleyan University in Connecticut. He wrote a Huffington Post blog to articulate the good in a liberal arts education. He writes, “Liberal learning introduces [students] to books and the music, the science and the philosophy that form disciplined yet creative habits of mind that are not reducible to the material circumstances of one’s life.” I didn’t go to Gustavus to collect a check somewhere down the road. The world is changing so rapidly, specific skills may be obsolete with a simple twist of fate.

No matter what I decided to major in, I came to Gustavus to learn. In the end, the last few years have shown me that learning is a lifelong endeavor. In all the classes I’ve taken, Buddhist philosophy, American history of the Cold War, Musical Theatre, and Macro Economics, I have only been inspired to know more about the world. I want to pay attention to the Political process in our country, the processes in the brain that make people who they are, and discover new ways for people to treat others with more respect. The thirst to learn is not just a tool to stick in your belt, it’s the reason you are using your tools to begin with. The way I see it, my college education is just the beginning of that journey, and that’s a difficult thing to put a price on.

 

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