If universities fail to teach critical-thinking skills, they will leave students unprepared for a changing economy.
The humanities and social sciences are failing. Their popularity in the US has been waning in recent years, as many students enter STEM fields to seek skills directly applicable to their careers, but the last few months have exposed a deeper weakness: The humanities and social sciences are no longer training students to be critical thinkers.
Not only does this failure create serious challenges for our culture and democracy. It also leaves students less able to manage a changing economy.
In the last decade, humanities enrollment has fallen 17%, as surveys show that more Americans now question the value of a college education: In 2015, 57% had a great deal or a lot of confidence in the US system of higher education, and now only 36% do. There is less desire among taxpayers to finance the humanities. West Virginia University is making drastic cuts to some of its humanities departments. North Carolina will no longer fund distinguished professorships at public universities in non-STEM fields.
Continue reading the entire piece here at Bloomberg Opinion (paywall)
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Allison Schrager is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor of City Journal.
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