POSITION PAPER nConsidering Liberal Learning and the Health Professions Charles R Fox, OD, PhD, FAAO BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE here or in any single article, nor is it possible Background and Purpose. There has to even begin an adequate exploration of its been much discussion among both There has been much discussion concern- implication. However, I present this paper liberal arts and professional programs ing the relationship between an education as an invitation to health professions educa- educators concerning the relationship in liberal arts and an education in a health tors to begin a public, nondisciplinary dialog between a liberal education and a pro- profession. Some take a traditional view that about the issues raised here. fessional education. The focus of these the classics are the core of a liberal arts edu- discussions is how a traditional liberal cation, and therefore are separate from and 1 The Issue arts education can inform a professional preparatory for the professions. Others take (entry-level) education. This paper refo- a more contemporary view, such as using Traditional liberal arts preparation for the cuses the discussion to consider profes- the arts or the humanities as supplemental professions sets up a false dichotomy, where- sional education as a de facto liberal instruction in certain areas of professional by students are presented with one set of 2-4 education. studies. academic experiences for their liberal educa- tion and a second set of experiences for their Position and Rationale. The author sug- In each view, the focus is how training professional education program. This sets gests separating a liberal education from in the traditional liberal arts can inform and up the expectation for students, and perhaps an education in a health profession has be included in a professional (entry-level) educators, that these are 2 different domains. distinct disadvantages and is not neces- course of study. This is reasonable and is the However, this distinction is arbitrary and sary. The author maintains that the di- traditional way of approaching a liberal edu- 5 nonessential. Further, the effects of this false chotomy between liberal and professional cation in the professions. In fact, even some distinction is amplified in current models of education is false. Professional education of the most progressive thinkers in the area, advanced training in the professions in that for all of the major health professions can such as Lee Shulman and colleagues at the little attempt is made to integrate liberal and accomplish the goals of a liberal educa- Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement preprofessional education, that is, education tion. of Teaching, still speak of a liberal arts edu- cation and a professional education as sepa- completed as a prerequisite to entering entry Discussion and Conclusions. The back- rate domains. A recent Carnegie-sponsored level professional programs. In fact, prepro- ground and significance of the traditional research seminar6 sought to “give public ex- fessional education is often only valued to distinction between liberal and profes- pression and form to a critical component of the extent that it directly supports advanced, sional education are described. The basic professional and liberal arts education” and didactic professional training. For example, goals of traditional liberal education and spoke of linking “the training of … other a physical therapist student, by definition a their relation and relevance to modern professionals with the core aspects of the lib- graduate student in America, will be called professional education are discussed. eral arts.” However, I ask you to consider the upon to apply their undergraduate biology Both general and specific examples of a possibility that separating a liberal education training throughout much of their profes- professional education as a liberal educa- from an education in the professions has dis- sional education. But where will undergrad- tion are presented. The discussion ends tinct disadvantages and is not necessary. Fur- uate literature course work be called upon with a call to action for focused, public di- ther, I contend that a professional education during the professional education program? alog among health professions educators can also be a liberal education. Or, let us assume our students had a more on the relation of liberal and professional progressive liberal arts education and read education with the goal of reconceptual- Proposition some novels and wrote some papers as a part izing the relationship between the 2 types of a more integrated seminar in biology (eg, of education. I suggest here that achieving the goals of a liberal education does not require exposure as part of an Interdisciplinary Studies major Key Words: Liberal arts, Professional ed- 7 to specific disciplines, but rather to certain at Arizona State University and elsewhere). ucation, Liberal education, Professional manners of thinking. The separation of the What still exists is the very real issue of how pedagogy. liberal arts from the professions and other learning fostered by this literary experience disciplines has created a historical, but un- gets integrated into the students’ professional necessary, dichotomy. I maintain that this di- education and training. Charles R Fox is the associate dean for chotomy is false, and preparation for all of the Academic Affairs & Research at the Wichita major professions can accomplish the goals A Liberal Education: Part I State University, College of Health Profes- of a liberal education. The fact that training To begin to explore the hypothesis of this sions, 1845 Fairmount, Box 43, Wichita, for the health professions does not currently paper, that professional education can be a Kansas 67260-0043, USA (charles.fox@ teach these liberal arts skills is a matter of liberal education as well, let us first examine wichita.edu). chosen emphasis rather than an intrinsic as- the goals of a liberal education. The term Received November 28, 2006, and accepted pect of professional preparation. Of course, artes liberals, or liberal arts, derives from the February 29, 2008. such a hypothesis cannot be fully explored Latin libera, meaning freedom. In the classi- 12 Journal of Physical Therapy Education Vol 22, No 2, Fall 2008 cal world, a liberal education was designed liberal arts consisted of 2 parts: the Trivium of of logic serves to develop skills of careful rea- to enlarge the mind, cultivate civic virtue, grammar, logic, and rhetoric; and the Qua- soning, and can be understood as arranging and develop the full human potential so that drivium of mathematics, music, astronomy, and connecting facts and information, that a human being could be a free citizen. More and geometry. Once these arts of learning is, the transforming of data into informa- recently, Martha Nussbaum in Cultivating were mastered, the student was considered tion. We may consider this as developing Humanity7 speaks of a liberal education appropriately equipped to begin the study an understanding of the matter of interest as one that liberates the mind, producing of the sciences. After this regimen, a student in the sense that knowledge and judgment world citizens that function with alertness then would begin to study a profession. result in understanding. Rhetoric is the skill and sensitivity. Clearly, the goals of a liberal of effective—or perhaps we should say per- education have remained constant; a classic Is a Liberal Education Still Relevant? suasive—communication, but more broadly liberal arts education has formed the corner- In modern education, we have grown far deals with putting this gathered and ordered stone of education for centuries throughout away from the traditional liberal education information into practical expression/action. the world. The 7 liberal arts (listed below) practices. This traditional liberal arts curric- That is, gaining applied wisdom about the were the seeds of classical wisdom that were ulum is from another time and place, and matter of interest. This same procedure of rescued and preserved by the monasteries does not deal with contemporary subjects gaining knowledge, developing understand- throughout the so-called “Dark Ages.” The such as literature, art, and psychology, much ing, and applying wisdom can be considered Renaissance reintroduced them as the curric- less computer science and artificial intelli- a meta-cognitive process, applicable not only ulum of the first universities where they also gence. It can be argued that many modern to the formal subject matter of the liberal arts served as the basis for the study of medicine subjects such as psychology and artificial but also to many other domains, including and law, 2 of the earliest professions. These intelligence are “applied” or ”professional”; professional education. liberal arts also flourished uninterruptedly in however, at issue is more than just new dis- the philosophy, art, and science of medieval ciplines that may or may not be new exem- Professional Education as a Liberal Islam. It can be argued from evidence seen plars. I suggest we ask: Are the liberal arts Education (an example) in the sacred canons (eg, measurement, ar- truly relevant to contemporary professional Let us consider the example of how study- chitectural, and artistic proportion) as well as education (or indeed for contemporary so- ing physical therapy applies, perhaps unwit- musical scales and calendrical cycles that the ciety), or simply ghosts and distant echoes