Recent trends in higher education have focused heavily on maximizing profit for business ventures, typically through marketing strategies that appeal to students’ desire to get a good grade while avoiding material of strong opposition. This has resulted in fewer classes with rigorous mathematical content and more courses that require little-to-no mathematics beyond taking notes and doing some simple calculations.
Mathematics is an important tool for understanding almost everything around us, including liberal arts disciplines like English and history. Therefore, limiting the availability or quality of math can limit your knowledge base dramatically. And since most people are needed to function effectively in our society, limiting your mathematical literacy is very risky.
This article will discuss why it is important to learn basic math skills even if you don’t plan on becoming a doctor, lawyer, or other professional who requires such expertise. You may also want to check out my article about how to teach yourself math!
I hope you enjoy reading this essay and educating yourself on one of the major reasons why everyone should know their algebra.
Reasons why liberal arts is important
One of the biggest reasons why liberal art degrees exist and will continue to be popular are because they teach you how to think.
Liberal arts courses promote critical thinking, logic, and analysis skills that can be applied in many different areas. These areas include business, journalism, marketing, health professional services, education, and more.
Studies show that people who learn social studies (history, economics, politics) are less likely to believe in pure theories such as evolution or creationism. People with humanities backgrounds are less likely to hold strong beliefs about moral issues like abortion or same-sex marriage.
Furthermore, experts agree that students who study the humanities go onto successful careers more often than not. According Evidence Based Education, one Harvard University report found that “those with BA or BAs in Humanities were nearly twice as likely as those with only an ED degree [Education] to earn at least a master’s degree or higher within six years of completing their bachelor’s.
Limits of liberal arts
The most common way to describe the field of “liberal art” is as “the study of culture.” This definition, while very broad, can sometimes be misunderstood.
By that definition, anyone could say they are studying the humanities because anything with a name in italics is considered part of the humanities.
However, this definition excludes many areas of human knowledge that are not explicitly named under the humanities. These include fields like biology, chemistry, physics, or even mathematics!
Furthermore, it ignores the fact that some disciplines use concepts from other branches for their studies. A student might take classes in literature but also have to do math in order to understand what they were reading.
This isn’t always the case, but it does happen now more than ever before. Technology has made numbers increasingly relevant to our daily lives. Everything we create, shop online, and finance transactions using computers and software requires math.
In fact, one could make an argument that having access to math is a prerequisite to participating fully in modern life. It is simply too easy to avoid doing things like adding and subtracting when buying groceries or paying bills via paypal.
So how hard is liberal arts math? That depends on you and your definitions of difficult. If you’re thinking about tough math courses designed to challenge students, then yes, these exist at the college level.
Cost of going to school
The other major cost associated with attending college is tuition. This costs per-student depending on your budget and how much you are paying in student loans already!
Tuition at most four year universities can easily be over $20,000 a year. Some students pay even more than that!
Four years equals an undergraduate degree so this includes studying math, science, literature, social studies and the like. All these subjects require different levels of mathematics so it cannot be said that no one outside the field requires advanced math.
Most students are advised to take some sort of general education courses as well. These are not necessarily considered liberal arts but they prepare you for many things such as business, medicine or any profession.
These courses typically do not focus too heavily on just mathematics but include algebra, geometry, statistics and the like. Depending on which university you attend these vary slightly.
Difficulty of topics in liberal arts
Topics within the field of liberal studies include things like humanities, social sciences, languages, and mathematics. While some students feel that math is easy because they took it in high school, this isn’t necessarily the case!
Many people who have studied hard math go onto other fields to use their skills more effectively. For example, someone with very good algebra skills may become a business major or an accountant, while others pursue advanced degrees in statistics, engineering, or physics.
Furthermore, practicing math on subjects outside its realm can be tricky at best and difficult at worst. This is why many soft programs drop mathematical content from their courses- even if these departments are not totally without numbers!
Liberal arts majors often have extensive knowledge about different areas of study so they move into other disciplines as professionals. These other disciplines sometimes require mathematical concepts and tools, making them more intuitive for the student.
Time commitment
One of the hardest things about studying liberal arts is that there are no clear milestones, such as when classes end or exams occur. There’s not even an obvious cutoff for graduation, since most students don’t graduate with a degree in something like English but instead have to add additional courses here and there to get their bachelor’s.
In fact, some people barely make it through school without taking many more than they should, due to persistent testing and project deadlines. This can be very difficult if you’re someone who doesn’t enjoy spending lots of time doing things, especially given how expensive college can be!
Fortunately, we’ve put together a comprehensive list of hard math concepts for you to review before hitting the books. While these may sound complicated, they’re actually pretty easy to grasp, and every student should know at least one.
We’ll go over them in order of difficulty, from basic arithmetic to algebra, geometry, and trigonometry.
Job prospects
Along with business, liberal arts majors are prepared to work in fields such as medicine, teaching, or research. Many employers look favorably on degrees from large universities like ours that require students to be creative and apply different learning strategies to solve problems.
Liberal arts degree programs often emphasize studying humanities, which include things like literature, history, and philosophy. These studies focus more on understanding how ideas relate to each other rather than just testing knowledge of one specific topic. This is why many colleges offer major courses such as writing, speech, economics, psychology, and sociology.
These areas connect individual topics together into concepts and systems that help you understand how people interact with each other and society at large. For example, studying sociology will teach you about what makes societies break down due to overpopulation, overproduction, and overconsumption. All three of these occur in our current society so much that we see riots, protests, and wars nearly every day!
Studies of political science can tell you about why governments form and evolve, how power works in groups, and how to effectively use power for good or bad. Businesses almost always need someone who knows basic accounting, finance, and marketing, but beyond that they’ll ask you to do advanced financial planning or manage their budgeting, etc.
Medical professionals study health and disease on the molecular level so they can figure out better ways to prevent and treat it.
Popular majors in liberal arts
Some popular major options in university departments that are considered to be more “liberal” include communication, anthropology, sociology, psychology, political science, art history, theater, music education, fashion design, or business administration.
A lot of students choose these major paths because they’re very familiar. You can probably tell already what field this degree is in!
These degrees focus heavily on studying topics like socialization, leadership, persuasion, communication techniques, theories such as those related to cultural studies, etc. — all important skills for life.
Some areas within these majors require no math beyond basic arithmetic, while others ask you to do some simple algebra and geometry.
But none of it makes too much difference, especially if you’re looking to get a well-paying job in an area like marketing or advertising.
And don’t worry about getting left out either – there are many career opportunities outside of marketing where individuals with these majors are highly sought after.
Popular careers in liberal arts
Many people believe that to be an educated person, you have to go into business or science or engineering. You can’t be a student anymore unless you know how to use Microsoft Word or Excel!
But this is only half-true. There are actually lots of jobs out there where being educated doesn’t matter at all — or even if it slightly disadvantages you as a job applicant.
In fact, some employers actively look for students over experienced workers because they perceive students as more motivated and engaged employees.
And while it may sound crazy, many experts agree that having an extensive background in humanities like psychology, art history, or literature makes you a better employee.
Liberal arts degrees don’t teach you how to do math, but they help you understand what makes someone else smart enough to perform well in math.
