In today's New York Times, Thomas Friedman writes about the need for new skills for workers. They can't just wait for new jobs to be "handed to them," but need to think creatively. Sound familiar? The humanities are about creativity, and viewing things in a new way.
Read Thomas Friedman's editorial here.
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I agree with Friedman: vanilla does not cut it nowadays. We face a new economic world where Americans will indeed need to be more creative and innovative than ever before. At the same time, I believe that education plays just one of the important roles in changing the way we think about our economic functions as individuals in the middle of an economic collapse. Both universities and parents often give students the impression that a major should define the post-grad career path. This dwarfs, if not completely eliminates, the entrepreneurial spirit of the educated. We who have graduated know the major usually does not define the career path one chooses when one graduates. Yes, Americans need to be both educated and competative in a global economy. At the same time, more education will only be useful if we, as Americans, give up the notion that a major defines what you do and who you are once you graduate.
ReplyDelete-Carmen