The Displaced Plainsman gleefully (I enjoy picturing the Plainsman gleeful) comments on new USD president Sheila Gestring’s welcome defense of liberal arts education as a keystone of workforce development:
The uniqueness of a liberal arts education is that we teach our students how to be problem solvers and how to think critically…. A liberal arts education actually gives a person an advantage as technology and the world changes at an ever quickening pace…. Communication skills are also very, very important, and that’s at the foundation of liberal arts as well [Dr. Sheila Gestring, audio, in “USD President Sheila Gestring: Liberal Arts Education Adds to Workforce Development,” WNAX Radio, 2018.07.25].
It’s unfortunate that university heads have to defend the liberal arts from political leaders, but it’s refreshing when they do so cogently [“Governor Daugaard Is Probably Glad She Didn’t Mention Philosophy,” The Displaced Plainsman, 2018.07.25].
Dr. Gestring, of course, is speaking the language of Governor Dennis Daugaard and other narrow-minded political leaders who think education is a mere cost, justified only by the workers and dollars it generates for their corporate cronies. I’m happy to use that defense if we must, but we should also always append a reminder to that defense that a liberal arts education is also the underpinning of democracy and enlightened civilization.
DP and DFP will never give Governor Daugaard a pass on his dismissal of the value of philosophy and other core liberal arts courses. Perhaps we need to get the fall debate moderators to pose a question on philosophy and liberal arts education to our gubernatorial candidates. It will be interesting who better defends the merits of liberal arts education, Democrat Billie Sutton, who got his degree from the University of Wyoming in business finance a year after his rodeo accident; Republican Kristi Noem, who got her degree in political science eighteen years after dropping out of college; or Libertarian Kurt Evans, who got his degree in math and education.
Gleeful? That’s an adjective that few have applied to me.
Thanks for the reminder that one should always finish one’s argument and not assume others will reach the same conclusions for facts provided. I agree she starts her argument on the ground Daugaard and the others who believe that only the workplace matters have established.
I believe, however, she opened a new front for the South Dakota portion of the liberal arts vs workplace skills debate when she discussed the fact that the liberal arts are necessary to understand how technology is creating an evolving workplace.
As one examines what the workplace is evolving from and to, one must go beyond the 1s and 0s that make the machines work (I know I’m dating myself) and examine how the evolution in the workplace will affect the social and political space.
At the risk of committing history, sociology, and philosophy without a license, digital is accelerating exponentially the changes begun by Edison’s light bulb and electricity. Too few political leaders and public intellectuals are discussing that change. (I don’t know how many are capable of discussing it.)
The fact that Gestring hints at the importance of understanding that evolution on any level moves moves the discussion away from “only the job matters” thinking in an important way.
Regardless of the degree most jobs in South Dakota are very low paying.
Amen Kelly…it is sad, now all the trolls that see this will tell you and me to then just leave the state, they like being poor. It is such a nice place to live, cost of living is low, shoveling snow is good for you, you get to drive 80 on the Interstate.
We graduate about 7000 students a year from our South Dakota Public Higher Education system. Plus the privates, I wonder how many of them stay? The best thing about a liberal arts education (I do not have one by the way) is that people learn to think, not just believe.
On the bright side, in a few years you should know for a certainty living in South Dakota is better than Mars. Both places will still be red and I’m guessing Mars has lower taxes and less services provided by the government. Mars isn’t nearly the corruption eruption South Dakota is, but give it time and mayhaps it will be.
Plus you shouldn’t have to break any treaties with anyone to take the land for wasicus.
I like your “bright side” Mike. 😁
There’s additional proof that public schools such as USD and state elementary and high schools do a great job of educating students.
Here: https://goo.gl/EaNxVe
Duagaard trampled all over the Laurie Walsh interview over his determination to “dilute a high school diploma with welding” (my cynical spin on his leadership failure to understand philosophy). Maybe just make Republican classes a graduation requirement. Or mold students in “Koch-think).
“Workforce development” overstates. Job-site skill training is more accurate. I do not believe we are teaching the future workforce the value of belonging to unions and professional organizations to empower them to fair wages and benefits and not settling for exploitative wages because of publicly financed and created pools of qualified employees for the market.
Cory writes:
I’ll probably try to defend the merits of asking, “Why should politicians decide what kinds of education our children get?” Let us keep the fruits of our labor and provide each of our own children with the education that maximizes his or her life, liberty and happiness.
The all-girls prep school I graduated from 50 years ago reinvented itself as a School for the Arts.
The campus is in disrepair, the library which once had leatherbound classics, oak furniture with leather upholstery is now a paint-splattered studio, the art collection was sold and replaced with student work of highly questionable value, the dining room which once featured carpet, chandelier lighting and round tables set with real linens now looks like any high school cafeteria.
Touring the old school I was reminded of the state hospital at Yankton.
The tuition and fees now ring in at $90,000/year, and the alumnae are still being hit up for money, in fact it became quite apparent that was the only purpose of having a reunion weekend. They sold us tickets to their “spring show,” without telling us what it was first. On learning it was a performance of “Urinetown,” many of us skipped it, and those who didn’t wished they had.
The graduates go on to audition for theater roles while waiting tables in restaurants and selling art on eBay.
If I don’t want to give my old school any more money, why should I want my taxes supporting this? Do you support the arts enough to write a check on your own bank account? Or would you rather help out a kid who is learning how to be an automotive mechanic?
Do they have opulent all girl schools for mechanics?
Just so we’re clear, the term performing arts ,which is what Anne seems to be discussing, is not a synonym for liberal arts, the focus of this post.
Anne cites one example of a school that does things she doesn’t like. I suppose if I find one vo-tech school that does things I don’t like, I prove that vo-tech education is also bad and we should just get rid of all higher ed and let the private sector handle all job training.
Hey, wait a minute….
Cory writes:
We may need a social consensus for state government to teach elementary students literacy and basic arithmetic, but if a vo-tech does things you don’t like, no government should force you to pay for it.
No, Kurt, I can’t take “don’t like it, don’t have to pay for it” as a governing principle. That leads to tax breaks for the crankiest.
If there are policies and programs I don’t like, my opportunity to defund them comes in elections and in the Legislative process. If I win that debate, we axe the offending program, and nobody pays for it. If supporters of the program win the debate—i.e., if they persuade enough voters that the program benefits society as a whole, justifying collective action, then we all pay for it. “Don’t like it, don’t pay for it” allows a cranky minority to withdraw from that public debate and effectively veto some programs by withholding necessary funding.