Liberal Arts Research Paper

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Recent debates about liberal arts education have brought up the question of whether or not obtaining a degree in such can actually aid one later in life. Many people challenge what profitable skills it would teach and view it as unimportant and frivolous. Yet, the skills that it teaches are some of the most needed skills in today’s culture for, as John Agresto emphasizes, “The liberal arts… teach skills: How to write better, speak more persuasively, listen attentively, analyze, calculate, describe, organize… [and] A country might have enough philosophers, we might be told, but what country has enough good ‘analyzers’?” (Agresto 40). Hence, a liberal arts degree is valuable because it teaches one to think creatively and become a more well-rounded …show more content…

New professions are being created and jobs that were high in demand are now diminishing. Students need to expand their abilities to solve cases in original ways. As Lorraine Smith Pangle puts it, “arts and sciences promote… thinking and com-munication skills that make that education so often a better preparation for success in business and public affairs… in a world in which most people change ca-reers at some point and many will pursue jobs and professions that did not exist when they were in school” (Pangle 208). Her point here is that jobs are not always reliable. However, inspired contemplation as taught through a liberal arts education can help workers learn to adapt to new situations and stay employed.
Furthermore, resourceful and artistic thinking also aids one in finding truth for themselves. What one accepts as truth and lives by defines who they are. In “Two Years Are Better Than Four” by Liz Addison she argues that the opportunity for self-discovery is far more important than “proving yourself worldly, insightful, cultured, [or] mature” which is the usual focus for education (Addison 213). In contrast, the process of creative thinking allows one to find what they believe, not just what everyone else tells them. Therefore, the liberal arts have great value in the aspect of

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