Double Majors Produce Dynamic Thinkers
One of the key characteristics and benefits of the Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Studies Program is that you can pursue interdisciplinary interests by studying in two distinct areas with the minor-minor combination path. The article below from The Chronicle of Higher Education recently featured a study on the impact of double majoring and the benefits of bridging different domains of knowledge!
Students who major in two fields are more apt than their single-majoring peers to think both integratively and creatively, according to a new study.
“Double majors give students the opportunity to build bridges between domains of knowledge, and many students travel those bridges regularly,” said Steven J. Tepper, an associate professor of sociology at Vanderbilt University and a co-author of “Double Majors: Influences, Identities, and Impacts,” a report describing the study
Mr. Tepper, who stuidies creativity, said the ability to see connections between very disparate methodologies and ways of knowing allows students to generate new ideas and novel theories.
[Source: http://chronicle.com/article/Double-Majors-Produce-Dynamic/137917/]
Tackling Complex Problems
From AAAS:
Kip Hodges firmly believes that solving the world’s major problems requires a multidisciplinary approach, yet much of the education
students receive is parceled out in separate, non-overlapping subjects.
“The problem is that most of the really exciting questions that face our society can only be solved using multidisciplinary modes of analysis from multiple fields,” said Hodges, who is a professor at Arizona State University and founding director of ASU’s School of Earth and Space Exploration. “We need to teach our undergraduates to think creatively beyond the boundaries of specific disciplines.”
Read the essay, “Solving Complex Problems,” by Kip Hodges.
See some of the final presentations from the MIT interdisciplinary course Solving Complex Problems.
Source:
Course that Takes Creative Approach to Complex Challenges Wins Science Prize
The Importance of a Liberal Arts (Interdisciplinary) Education
As the Shalem Center introduces Israel’s first liberal arts college, Prof. Steven Pinker (Harvard), Prof. Lera Boroditsky (Stanford) and Yoram Hazony (Shalem Center Provost) speak about the importance of a Liberal Arts (Interdisciplinary) education.
The New Liberal Arts: New Tools for a New Century
Michael Staton, a liberal arts graduate and founder of the tech company Inigral, Inc. considers how Liberal Arts students need to demonstrate their knowledge and embrace technological tools for a 21st century world.
The typical defense of the status quo involves spinning the value of a liberal arts education, pitching the curriculum as promoting the ability to problem-solve, learn to learn, and thrive in a knowledge economy. If the curriculum is teaching such skills as adapting to a knowledge economy, why can’t the professors that teach such great skills to thrive in a changing world employ them with some grace and poise? How can the liberal arts, itself, adapt to a changing world?
Simply put, we need to rethink what our students do to demonstrate their understanding. I’m not suggesting that we stop teaching literature and history and economics and psychology – or that students stop majoring in these fields. But we need to ask students to create, to experiment, to be bold and possibly fail with projects and deliverables relevant in today’s world. We’re too limited by Blue Book short essays and term papers — in which success is easily measured and bell-curved. If we shift the way we ask students to demonstrate their knowledge within liberal arts fields, we can prepare students for employment by advancing the liberal arts.
Read more: http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2012/10/16/essay-calling-new-skills-be-added-liberal-arts-disciplines#ixzz2A27Mcw6I
Inside Higher Ed
Communication via Comic Book
Nick Sousanis from Teacher’s College, Columbia University will present his work in comic books on the “Creative & Critical Minds” theme at noon in the Oakland Room of the OC (student center) on Wednesday, October 10, 2012.
Nick is a Detroiter now living in New York, co-founder of arts and culture web-mag www.thedetroiter.com, founding director for the University of Michigan Work-Detroit gallery (on Woodward Ave), and biographer of legendary Detroit artist Charles McGee.
Nick is currently writing and drawing his dissertation at Teachers College entirely in comic book form — the first of its kind. Anyone interested in the interaction of verbal and visual modes of communication — or something akin to Scott McCloud’s work in the now contemporary classic Understanding Comics — will find this presentation of interest.
Please see Nick’s comics at http://www.spinweaveandcut.blogspot.com/.
Sponsored by the CAS Theme committee and the Department of Writing and Rhetoric at Oakland University.
Contact Ben-Bennett-Carpenter (bennettc@oakland.edu | 248 854 8340)
Why a liberal arts education is the best job preparation
From the Christian Science Monitor:
If ever there was a time to emphasize a classic liberal arts education – more than distributing information or training for specific jobs – this is it. Students today can easily find information. The challenge is making sense of the whole, finding connections, dealing with complexity.
Facilitating Interdisciplinary Research and Education: A Practical Guide
The AAAS (The American Association for the Advancement of Science) has recently published this practical guide concerning Interdisciplinary Research and Education. The guide is available for free download in PDF format from their website (listed below) and includes sections on Creating Interdisciplinary Culture, Processes for Creating Interdisciplinary Programs, and Interdisciplinary Education.
Click here to go to the website and download the guide today!
