Education Or Reputation? a Look at America's Top-Ranked Liberal Arts

EducationA Look at America’sor Reputation? Top-Ranked Liberal Arts Colleges January 2014 AMERICAN COUNCIL OF TRUSTEES AND ALUMNI The American Council of Trustees and Alumni is an independent, nonprofit organization committed to academic freedom, academic excellence, and accountability at America’s colleges and universities. Founded in 1995, ACTA is dedicated to working with alumni, donors, trustees, and education leaders across the United States to support liberal arts education, uphold high academic standards, safeguard the free exchange of ideas on campus, and ensure that the next generation receives an intellectually rich, high-quality education at an affordable price. Education or Reputation? A Look at America’s Top-Ranked Liberal Arts Colleges a report by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni January 2014 Acknowledgments This report was prepared by the staff of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, primarily Dr. Michael Poliakoff, vice president of policy, and Armand Alacbay, Esq., director of trustee programs, with the assistance of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE). Unless otherwise stated, all data are based on publicly available information including academic catalogs, news releases, institutional websites, and media reports. Since its founding in 1995, ACTA has counseled boards, educated the public, and published reports about such issues as good governance, historical literacy, core curricula, the free exchange of ideas, and accreditation. ACTA has previously published The Vanishing Shakespeare; The Hollow Core: Failure of the General Education Curriculum; Degraded Currency: The Problem of Grade Infl ation; Becoming an Educated Person: Toward a Core Curriculum for College Students; Losing America’s Memory: Historical Illiteracy in the 21st Century; Setting Academic Priorities: A Guide to What Boards of Trustees Can Do; Are They Learning?: A College Trustee’s Guide to Assessing Academic Effectiveness; and Cutting Costs: A Trustee’s Guide to Tough Economic Times, among other reports. For further information, please contact: American Council of Trustees and Alumni 1726 M Street, NW, Suite 802 Washington, DC 20036 Phone: 202.467.6787 • Fax: 202.467.6784 GoACTA.org • [email protected] CONTENTS Foreword Overview 1 General Education 1. What are students learning? 5 Intellectual Diversity 2. Do schools promote a free exchange of ideas? 14 Cost & Effectiveness 3. How much are students paying? 20 4. Where is the money going? 24 Recommendations 32 Appendices Appendix A: Criteria for Evaluating Core Courses 35 Appendix B: School Evaluation Notes for Core Courses 37 End Notes 41 FOREWORD Foreword ead nearly any college catalog today and it will proportion of recent college graduates, responded that R prominently recognize the importance of a all students should take basic classes in core subjects. rich liberal arts education, for “preparing students They seem to recognize, in the face of stark economic to be engaged, adaptable, independent, and capable reality, that a strong coherent curriculum can provide citizens” (Bowdoin College), to ensure that “[every] the skills and knowledge they need to compete.3 graduate has explored a variety of subjects from Society thrives when there is common ground for many perspectives, communicates effectively, and can communication—a common conversation. And the analyze and solve problems in many contexts” (Bates sorry truth is that much of the deterioration we see in College).1 our public debate can be traced to deterioration in the But these are empty promises. academy—seen all too often in liberal arts colleges— of the common core of learning and understanding Despite understanding how vital a liberal arts that connects us as a nation. education is to the individual and to our nation’s economic and civic future, few colleges are delivering That’s why we decided to undertake this study. a liberal arts education of quality. Employers—in large We know this is not the first such study. But we offer numbers—are saying that college graduates don’t have more than platitudes. We offer a concrete prescription the knowledge or skills they need to fill jobs in the for change. This is not a call for more financial rapidly changing marketplace. Noting weaknesses, the support or a rationalization for higher tuitions or a Commission on the Humanities and Social Sciences justification for more student services. Indeed, as the urged colleges to reverse the fragmentation of their following charts will show, our liberal arts colleges curricula, and improve teacher training and foreign aren’t suffering from too little spending. They are language instruction.2 spending enormous amounts of money, but have lost Surveys, including those from elite institutions, show touch with their educational mission and purpose. that college graduates are woefully ignorant when it There is no question that students can still obtain an comes to both fundamental academic skills and to excellent education at our most highly-ranked liberal the very basics of citizenship. They don’t know the arts institutions. As long as admissions offices remain term lengths of members of Congress, and they can’t selective, the mere aggregation of smart students identify the general at the Battle of Yorktown or the will create education. But, in too many places, it is father of the United States Constitution. also possible to invest a quarter million dollars in an Young adults know what’s at stake. When polled, 80% education that ends in little intellectual growth, nar- of those surveyed ages 25-34, including a significant rowed perspectives, and which qualifies the graduate EDUCATION OR REPUTATION? A LOOK AT AMERICA’S TOP-RANKED LIBERAL ARTS COLLEGES FOREWORD for very little. Anthony Kronman at Yale, Harry Lewis These experts are right. at Harvard, Alan Charles Kors at the University of The crisis of confidence in liberal arts education is Pennsylvania, and others have outlined what they have caused by self-inflicted wounds. But as outlined in the variously referred to as “education’s end,” “excellence following pages, there is a solution, if only trustees, without a soul,” and a “shadow university.” Sociolo- administrators, and faculty will do their jobs. Higher gist Richard Arum has noted that “[C]ollege students education needs to reclaim the standards of “higher,” on average are learning less, even as tuition costs in and liberal arts colleges must rededicate themselves to many institutions have risen sharply and competition the liberality of mind. for jobs has increased . Institutions that fail to set meaningful expectations, a rigorous curriculum, and Anne D. Neal high standards for their students are actively contrib- President uting to the degradation of teaching and learning.”4 American Council of Trustees and Alumni A REPORT BY THE AMERICAN COUNCIL OF TRUSTEES AND ALUMNI Increasingly, we need to have the courage to defi ne what greatness is, what’s most important to know and to teach students. – Lawrence Summers, former Secretary of the Treasury “ and President Emeritus of Harvard University” OVERVIEW Overview he residential liberal arts college is a distinctively of 18 and 46 alone. In a recent survey, 93% of em- TAmerican tradition, and for generations its ployers asserted that mastery of a range of skills that distinguishing feature has been the broad, yet rigorous are traditionally associated with the liberal arts was intellectual experience in the arts and sciences that it more important than the college major.7 required of all students. Studies have demonstrated Yet students have been migrating from arts, the success of individuals in a wide variety of roles humanities and social sciences to fi elds that whose college education was in the liberal arts rather seem to promise easier paths to employment, like than a narrower technical fi eld. As early as 1956, Bell communications and business. And some governors Laboratories began scientifi cally tracking the career and schools are taking a narrow and rigidly vocational progress of staff with different academic preparation. view of higher education—one that steers students Over a 20-year period with the company, liberal toward high-demand majors and preprofessional arts majors progressed more rapidly and in greater programs at the expense of a wider liberal arts percentage than other staff. Bell’s report, released in background.8 1981, concluded: [T]here is no reason for liberal arts majors to The battle between advocates of the liberal arts and lack confi dence in approaching business ca- those who call for a narrower, ostensibly more effi - reers. The humanities and social science majors cient and pragmatic training for a professional career in particular continue to make a strong showing has raged for centuries. in managerial skills and have experienced con- Cardinal John Henry Newman argued passionately in siderable business success. We hope and expect The Idea of the University, that the liberal arts remain this to continue.5 the core mission of higher education. A narrowly And a recent study commissioned by the Association trained individual, Newman warned, “trained to think of American Colleges and Universities also supports upon one subject or for one subject only, will never be the marketplace competitiveness of liberal arts a good judge even in that one: whereas the enlarge- majors.6 ment of his circle gives him increased knowledge and power in a rapidly increasing ratio.” And Newman The economic reality of the 21st century is that the admonished his readers to remember that a liberal skills, knowledge, and intellectual agility that come education is not only preparation for all careers, but it from a solid liberal arts education are more valuable is a preparation for living in and serving a community: than ever. The Bureau of Labor Statistics now reports that the average person born between 1957 and 1964 It aims at raising the intellectual tone of society, at held an average of 11.3 different jobs between the ages cultivating the public mind, at purifying the na- A REPORT BY THE AMERICAN COUNCIL OF TRUSTEES AND ALUMNI 1 OVERVIEW tional taste, at supplying true principles to popular community.

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