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To effectively embed experiential learning, the whole university needs to buy into the idea, says Trisha Craig
As is well known, liberal arts institutions (and indeed the notion of the liberal arts itself) are under pressure from many quarters. Politicians, funders and parents fear that the model of more general – rather than vocational – training may be both inadequate and too expensive for the economic conditions of slow growth, wage stagnation and underemployment that many advanced economies face.
While such fears are real, and are particularly exacerbated in the US where the debt that many students and their families take on to finance university education is high, there is something of a disconnect between the view of the liberal arts’ irrelevance and the needs of the modern economy. Few actually contend that vocational education alone is in the best interest of growth and competitiveness.
University leaders are fond of saying that the job of higher education today is to prepare students for jobs that have not yet been invented while business leaders assert that besides specific vocational skills, they are at least as interested in general competencies such as finding and integrating information, communication capabilities, ethical decision-making, or being able to function as part of a team.
