(Re) Signing the liberal arts and sciences

It's a sobering moment when the world changes around you and you suddenly realize you hadn't even noticed. Suddenly you are passé. I still remember my Dad's face when I played Hendrix on volume 500 for the first time; bye bye blackbird. I'm sure my oldest son remembers my face when he played Motörhead for me at volume 1000. Bye bye Stones. Suddenly one's cherished harmonies seem irrelevant or, at best, strangely quaint. Passé.

As the Provost of a brilliant University renowned for its liberal arts and science programs, its commitment to social justice, its proud traditions of activism and engagement, it's been a sobering few days. We've read announcements that York has a first year cohort of 6100 students, due to more applications in the university's health, science, and applied science programs; that Nipissing has experienced a 26% increase in part time studies and in new programs in science, math, technology and commerce. In addition, both federal and provincial governments have provided material support for the STEM disciplines (science, technology, engineering, and math), as well as Business and commerce.

Have we suddenly become quaint, mildly outdated, strangely cute, like a bewildered old uncle, in our insistence on the value of a liberal university education? Have we become passé? I think NOT.

The apparent "change" in the post-secondary landscape has elicited an intriguing dialectic between those who trumpet the arrival of a new pragmatism amongst students (can I get a job with that?) and those who traipse out the by-now tired arguments about safeguarding civilization against the barbarian hordes. What interests me in this binarism is (a) the seductive allure of a utilitarian defence of the liberal arts and sciences (these are critical disciplines, we bleat, that teach students how to think critically, analyze, make connections and so on); (b) the risible assumption that today's students are totally market driven; and finally, (c) the bovine notion that science, technology, engineering, math, health sciences, professional programs, business, and commerce are somehow devoid of imagination, elegance, and wonder. These rigorous disciplines are, apparently, merely pragmatic preparations for an interview. Right. Tell that to Asaf Zohar.

What intrigues me in all of this discourse is the official desire for purity, the unspoken authoritarian need for disciplinary tidiness. Somehow the "hard" subjects seem better because they are pragmatic and utilitarian; the "soft" subjects seem useless and irrelevant to the real world of the marketplace. What a paltry vision of both the world and the human mind.

What interests me (and buoys me up) is the fact that the liberal arts and sciences were long ago re-signed (i.e.,"re-signatured") at Trent. Whether it's Chemistry or Philosophy, Business or International Development Studies, Indigenous Studies or Physics, these disciplines at Trent all embody a creative messiness, a delicious ragged-edginess of interdisciplinarity, of critical inquiry that crosses lines and troubles pundits. Maybe it's time we point this out in our advertising; maybe we need to be less shy about blowing our own horns. But the simple fact is that at Trent the liberal arts and sciences, as well as the professional programs, educate our people, not only in order to get jobs, but more importantly n order to wonder and to ask "why?". We're not an either/or sort of institution. We're more the both/and type.

Whatever shape our academic plan takes it will need to respect these qualities of a Trent education; the plan will have to be messy, interdisciplinary, and utterly devoted to creativity, imagination, and wonder.

Thoughts?