In Defense of Liberal Arts Education

Post Reply New Topic

If you think that university education involves indoctrination then you haven't spent any time in a quality, liberal arts institution. The liberal arts are all about critical thinking.

As for entrepreneurship, I take the view that it is not a skill that can be taught. You can teach the skills that are necessary to it--like critical thinking and analytical rigour. But you can no more teach someone to be an entrepreneur than you can teach a person to be an artist. You can give a person the craft skills, but it is up to the individual to apply creativity to those skills to create something new.



I apologize for creating the impression that I believe that education is always superior. My intention was merely to suggest that for the majority of people for whom university is an option that they will meet with greater success with a degree than without one. But I am well aware that university education is not for everyone.

In the US, our public school system teaches that college is the path to success. No alternatives are presented. Our children are taught that success means getting a degree and working for someone else. Maybe things are different in Canada.


I can partially agree with this. I think you are right in that there is a spirit to entrepreneurism that isn't very teachable, but I do think that you can teach people to think like an entrepreneur.


I agree with you. For the majority, higher education is likely the best option. I just get frustrated when it's sold as the only way to succeed.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/nat ... le6385595/

Seemed relevant.

adb and visagrust. About entrepreneurship, when I did my undergrad degree I had the chance to take an course on entrepreneurship. It was run by an professor of entrepreneurship in the business school of my university. The way he taught the subject was with a mix of theory, critical and creative thinking skills plus debates.

A good dealt of the debates were about the qualities one needs to be an entrepreneur, myths around the idea of being an entrepreneur, how do entrepreneurs gain success, plus is business failure an learning tool for entrepreneurs.

thewhitrbbit: have you ever hear of the STEAM fields? Its the STEM fields plus A for the Arts.

That's awesome. I'd love to see that kind of thing taught in primary or secondary education.

I think I'd be a good example of using business failure as a learning tool. Much of it could have been avoided if I had been involved in something like that.

When I was at school we did a business start up project. I know over the years in the UK there been an increase of entrepreneurial education in schools. At that age school kids need IMHO to be able to plan an start up, and get it up and running as a project plus add some talks about entrepreneurship from local entrepreneurs. Also add mentoring for school leavers who wish to become entrepreneurs. At that age its the mix learning the skills, and getting the experience both via from hands on learning plus from others who have done it and have the stories to share about there ups and down.