Liberal Education and America’s Promise

College Learning for an Era of Greater Expectations

 

The approach to higher learning that best serves individuals, our globally engaged democracy and an innovating economy is liberal education. Liberal education comes in many shapes and forms in the contemporary academy, but in every one of those forms, its aims include developing intellectual and ethical judgment; expanding cultural, societal and scientific horizons; cultivating democratic and global knowledge and engagement; and preparation for work in a dynamic and rapidly evolving economy....

Presidents’ CALL: A statement signed by more than five hundred college and

university presidents, representing the entire postsecondary community.

                       

For most of history the advantages of a liberal education were reserved for a privileged few. Today, that situation has fundamentally changed.

 

A dynamic and globally interdependent economy is placing a new premium on complex intellectual skills and understandings. In response, Americans are flocking to college. Postsecondary learning has become the new standard for educational accomplishment and economic opportunity.

 

These developments create the opportunity to provide an empowering and horizon-expanding liberal education to an entire generation of students, whatever their background or intended career. Like the GI Bill after World War II, this investment in talent development would pay dividends many times over, both for the economy and for U.S. democracy.

 

But there are also significant barriers standing in the way of a widespread commitment to excellence for every student. Many people—including many college students—firmly believe that the only purpose of college is job training alone. Public policy and popular culture reinforce this perception. As a result, students frequently ask much less of college than they need and deserve. In addition, the majority of students arrive on campus unprepared for the intellectual demands of a good liberal education. And, all too often, especially in the first years of college, many students find themselves in classes that do little to change their lack of interest in science, culture, and the wider world.

 

The Challenge

The challenge, colleges and universities are beginning to understand, is to become far more intentional and creative in their approach to undergraduate education. Campuses need to help an entire generation of students recognize that liberal education will be their strongest preparation both for a changing economy and for a diverse and globally connected democracy. And, campuses need to redesign their practices to ensure that students graduate well-prepared for an era characterized by greater expectations in every sphere of life.

 

The higher education community is responding to this challenge. At the dawn of the 21^st century, many colleges and universities are beginning to move toward a New Academy with a newly inclusive vision for liberal education.

 

In its recent report, Greater Expectations: A New Vision for Learning as a Nation Goes to College, the Association of American Colleges and Universities has mapped out the contours of this New Academy--an academy energized by a new focus, across many institutions, on the kinds of learning that really matter in college.

 

Hundreds of colleges and universities are now experimenting with new approaches to liberal education that take into account students’ long-term career interests. In thematic first-year seminars and programs, in newly revitalized general education curricula, in topically linked courses and learning communities, in community-based service projects and internships, in online science experiments, in new intercultural studies and in a generation of advanced interdisciplinary curricula, colleges and universities are beginning to redefine the core practices of a 21^st century liberal education in ways that connect analysis and action.

 

But many of these innovative approaches to a more engaged and learning-intensive education still hover on the margins of the academy. Only a few campuses provide these forms of liberal education to all their students.

 

 

Public and policy demand could significantly speed up the pace of change. But the public is focused mainly on college access and cost. There has been almost no significant public dialogue about what students should actually accomplish in college, or about the kinds of practices best suited to the aims of a twenty-first century liberal education.

 

Most states have been working on school reform, but there has been only superficial attention to creating new educational connections between school and college so that both work together to help students achieve important educational outcomes. The dialogue of school reform seems to presuppose that college will stay as it has been, even as schools move to raise the standards and close the “preparation gap.” Policy leaders have been calling for academic “accountability” in higher education, but they too leave the basic question–accountability for what?–essentially unanswered.

 

An Advocacy Initiative: Engaging the Public and Policy Leaders With What Matters in College

Recognizing the public stake in the actual quality of college-level learning, AAC&U now seeks to shape a broad national dialogue on student learning in college. This national dialogue will examine the contemporary importance of liberal education in our society, and will make visible the changes already emerging on college and university campuses to help all students—especially those traditionally underserved—experience the benefits of an empowering liberal education.

 

Organized in concert with policy and business leaders, the media, campuses, and through campuses, with prospective students, this proposed campaign will be designed to:

 

·     Spark public debate about the kinds of knowledge, skills, and values needed to prepare college students for this era of greater expectations;

 

·     Challenge and change the widespread belief that students must choose either a practical education or a liberal education;

 

·     Sustain public engagement with the quality and level of college students’ preparation for, participation in, and cumulative accomplishment in liberal education;

 

·     Support every student’s right to a high quality education—beginning in school and culminating in college—that develops intellectual and ethical judgment; expands cultural, societal, and scientific horizons; cultivates democratic and global knowledge and engagement, and also prepares learners for successful participation in a dynamic and rapidly evolving economy;

 

·     Confront the inherent inequities in current practices that steer low-income students to college programs that teach job skills alone, while more advantaged students reap the full benefits of a first-rate liberal education;

 

·     Mobilize support for changes on campus that already are producing a new synthesis of practical and liberal education.

 

The campaign will include four primary strands of work:

 

(1) A public and policy advocacy initiative for liberal education, which will be led by a national Council for Liberal Education;

 

(2) Work with colleges and universities of every kind to develop and make visible new approaches to liberal education that can successfully prepare today’s students for the new demands–personal, professional and civic–of contemporary life;

 

(3) A research initiative designed to provide evidence and create “national indicators” for selected outcomes of a liberal education, especially analytical and communication skills; quantitative, scientific and information literacies; civic, global and cross-cultural knowledge and skills; ethical responsibility, and the ability to integrate learning from diverse contexts, fields and experiences.

(4) A related effort to enhance AAC&U’s own capacity to build public and policy understanding of what matters in college, and to become a public resource for evidence about the nation’s progress in providing liberal education to all its students.