February 28th, 2008
Survey Says…Math and Science Overshadow Liberal Arts
I love when the government tries to improve education. Over the past few years, Uncle Sam has either created or funded a number of programs to help revamp math and science instruction throughout the nation. The Mathematics and Science Partnership (MSP) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) are two notable examples.
As a former educator, I’m glad to see such a widespread effort. Improving education certainly deserves to sit atop the government’s ‘to-do’ list, and additional financial support definitely should be allocated to the endeavor when possible. As an historian, however, I must say that I’m a little disappointed. Here’s why.
Common Core, a research institution dedicated to advancing liberal arts and humanities in public schools, recently asked 1,200 high school students a series of multiple-choice questions on various historical and literary topics. While the survey represents only a segment of our nation’s young students, and doesn’t account for the ‘guess factor,’ the results are a little disturbing.
- 43% of students knew that the American Civil War was some time between 1850 and 1900
- 56% knew that The Scarlet Letter was about an unfaithful woman
- 60% knew that Odysseus had a long and arduous journey home
- 61% knew that World War II took place some time between 1900 and 1950
- 67% knew that the Bill of Rights guarantees freedom of speech and religion
- 74% knew that Christopher Columbus sailed to the New World before 1750
The Greeks believed that the arts were the foundation of education. The liberal arts (grammar, rhetoric, and logic) prepared young free men to study more complicated issues, e.g. matters of state, philosophy, and yes, even mathematics. The fine arts allowed for artistic expression and provided a window into humanity’s complicated nature. Homer’s Odyssey showed hero Odysseus use his cunning and intellect to outsmart the gods, yet still fall victim to the greed and stupidity of the mortals who accompanied him.
Though in a slightly different way, the arts continue to serve as the groundwork for advanced education. For example, lawyers use grammar, logic, and rhetoric to research, analyze, and communicate arguments on a daily basis. Furthermore, their ability to handle a case in the present often depends on their understanding of laws and political activities of the past. And as far as literature goes, who honestly can say that they didn’t learn a thing or two about racial injustice when they read To Kill a Mockingbird in the 8th grade?
In sum, I commend all of the politicians and non-profit organizations that strive to improve math and science in schools. However, let’s make sure this doesn’t impede our efforts to teach literature, history, music, art, and more to young students across the country.
At the risk of exposing my bias to our reader(s), I’ll end with a quote from Swiss historian Jacob Burckhardt (which he ‘borrowed’ from the illustrious Plato).
We study history not to be clever about another time, but to be wise for always.
Mine is also a biased perspective, but in light of what has been happening in our current government (obfuscation and destruction of government records) it seems that we should be putting more focus on the humanities than ever before. People I’ve spoken to about this (and who are a little further outside the historical discipline than I am) all ask the same kinds of questions: “how could this be happening?” They’re usually talking about the kinds of things that have shocked people about the current administration’s actions regarding the disappearance of e-mail records related to torture, and the Vice President’s preposterous claim to be outside the executive branch in order to keep his records from the public eye. I would suggest that these things are directly related to the neglect of the liberal arts in schools. People aren’t learning about the way our government works, or the history of our country’s founding, and therefore they are less likely to react when our government acts outside of the law. More importantly, an unbalanced education (one that focuses on science and math and leaves aside the arts) produces one sided people – people more likely to act without thinking, and stick to a “science is good regardless of the cost” mentality. But that’s just me.
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