Musings—COLA Humanities and Social Sciences Majors

As Director of Academic Excellence for the College of Liberal Arts (COLA), I have the chance to collect statistics on the number of students in our majors on campus and on line. My own field of study is English Language and Literature, and I also head up the Humanities Department. Though we talk about COLA as the “foundational” college of the university, we don’t often think of ourselves as a “liberal arts university” the way we used to. We don’t actively promote, for example, our undergraduate programs in English Literature, History, or Communications, though courses from these majors are part of our General Education and College of Education programs (as emphases).

So, imagine my surprise when I found out that in the early Spring Term of this year, we had 244 Communications majors, 167 English majors, 155 Interdisciplinary Studies majors, and 125 History majors. And this is just listed majors, not including College of Education students who are taking these subjects as emphases within their Education majors. Most of these Humanities majors are online students. These numbers are growing, all without a coordinated program of promotion for any of these majors; in fact, these majors are sometimes thought of as less important because they don’t lead to a specific job immediately upon graduation.

It’s clear though, that many students know what most employers tell us: traditional liberal arts majors are in demand, because they teach students how to think, how to read and interpret texts, and how to express themselves. Added to that, liberal arts majors are often more motivated learners, because they’re concentrating on something that they love for its own sake, rather than just for the sake of getting a diploma. Because a student of (say) literature or history interprets many kinds of writing (including writing by authors who are sometimes trying to lie to the reader), and because a student has to make arguments (both verbal and in writing) about what is being said, a liberal arts major is prepared for the kinds of reading and writing that are a part of higher-status professions like law, and upper business management (by the way, the higher one progresses in an organization, the more one has to write and communicate in other ways).

The interesting thing is that Canyon is a national leader in online liberal arts offerings; we are one of the relatively few universities across the country to support a range of liberal arts majors delivered entirely online. Students value that, and other major universities are now developing online humanities programs. We are working to keep our lead.