Sanford J. Ungar Analysis
Sanford J. Ungar: Defender of the Liberal Arts
William Butler Yeats is accredited with once saying “Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.” It seems this idiom no longer rings true; today’s preferred education encompasses the regurgitation of technical jargon in the hopes of finding a job. People now deem Liberal Arts degree worthless; it’s too expensive and impractical in today’s job market. The sciences and career colleges are where the jobs lie. In the battle over higher education, through his iconoclastic article “The New Liberal Arts,” Sanford J. Ungar stands as a lone crusader against an onslaught of “misperceptions.” I for one agree with and applaud his effort, although he could use some additional …show more content…
Higher education is not a one size fits all discipline. There has to be some to fill the factories, work the land, pave the roads and power the service industry. Unger is accurate in saying that the liberal arts should be available to everyone and everyone could benefit from this type of classical education; nonetheless not everyone is suited for such an education. The misperception that the liberal arts are for the elite is one that has been heard before but not nearly as much as the old “employers do not want to hire people with useless degrees” line which Unger obliterates with his next …show more content…
Ungar contests this misperception by showing that a degree in liberal arts also includes the sciences. He illustrates that a traditional liberal arts degree includes the sciences: “the historical basis of a liberal education is in the classical artes liberales, comprising the trivium (grammar, logic, and rhetoric) and the quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music)” (193). Many of Ungar’s points are valid; his handling of this misperception is deft and detailed. However, I feel that Ungar is stretching with his response to this argument. Although a liberal arts degree does offer some glimpses into the STEM disciplines, it is not comparable to a degree in those specialties. A student wishing to become a chemist would not be well served pursuing a degree in
William Butler Yeats is accredited with once saying “Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.” It seems this idiom no longer rings true; today’s preferred education encompasses the regurgitation of technical jargon in the hopes of finding a job. People now deem Liberal Arts degree worthless; it’s too expensive and impractical in today’s job market. The sciences and career colleges are where the jobs lie. In the battle over higher education, through his iconoclastic article “The New Liberal Arts,” Sanford J. Ungar stands as a lone crusader against an onslaught of “misperceptions.” I for one agree with and applaud his effort, although he could use some additional …show more content…
Higher education is not a one size fits all discipline. There has to be some to fill the factories, work the land, pave the roads and power the service industry. Unger is accurate in saying that the liberal arts should be available to everyone and everyone could benefit from this type of classical education; nonetheless not everyone is suited for such an education. The misperception that the liberal arts are for the elite is one that has been heard before but not nearly as much as the old “employers do not want to hire people with useless degrees” line which Unger obliterates with his next …show more content…
Ungar contests this misperception by showing that a degree in liberal arts also includes the sciences. He illustrates that a traditional liberal arts degree includes the sciences: “the historical basis of a liberal education is in the classical artes liberales, comprising the trivium (grammar, logic, and rhetoric) and the quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music)” (193). Many of Ungar’s points are valid; his handling of this misperception is deft and detailed. However, I feel that Ungar is stretching with his response to this argument. Although a liberal arts degree does offer some glimpses into the STEM disciplines, it is not comparable to a degree in those specialties. A student wishing to become a chemist would not be well served pursuing a degree in