A disturbing trend which has emerged lately among Republicans is to promote the idea that higher education should be in the business of promoting certain fields of study, certain majors, because there are more job opportunities in some areas of the curriculum.
Florida Governor Rick Scott has been speaking about this, and now House Majority Leader Eric Cantor did the same in a speech about “rebranding” the Republican Party.
The idea that politicians should be promoting any interference in the pursuit of education, the advancement of knowledge, and the encouragement of an open mind that might question the established ideas of a ruling class, is totally horrifying and unacceptable!
Yes, there may be more jobs in computer science, medicine, nursing, and accounting. But over time, every field of study has become oversupplied, and a college education is not just designed to promote certain job skills or trades. If one wants that, they can go to a technical institute or vocational school, and there is nothing wrong with that.
But a university or college education is designed to promote THINKING, ANALYSIS and TOLERANCE, and to be exposed to knowledge that otherwise might never be explored!
To discourage those who are interested in English, History, Philosophy, Political Science, Foreign Languages, Art, Music, and other liberal arts fields is to deny the development of an intellectual class, which can interpret and evaluate information, and be motivated by more than just materialism. And students who have majored in these and similar areas are often the best employees, because they have developed higher intellectual skills! There is no guarantee in today’s world that anyone will remain in the same field of work, no matter what one majors in while in a college or university.
We all need to make a living, and yes, some people in certain fields will make more money, but the goal of life should be to be happy, contented, enjoy one’s life work, and to assume that everyone who goes into “desirable” higher paying fields is happy or successful, is to live in a delusion!
All fields of knowledge are desirable, and exposure to as many as possible is a good thing, and politicians should stop any interference in the funding or advocacy of certain areas over others.
Anyone who gains a college or university education may not appreciate the exposure to many fields of knowledge in the short run, but as the years go by, one realizes the benefits of exposure to fields of knowledge, often not appreciated until many years later!
So Rick Scott, Eric Cantor, and anyone else considering interfering in higher education, back off!