[RoastBeats]

As a college-level instructor (with a PhD in those -- gasp -- liberal arts), might I suggest two things?

First, the critical thinking I learned reading poetry better prepared me for business management, web development, and entrepreneurship than any of my Chemistry courses (I was also a Chemistry minor in Undergrad). I'd be happy to go into the details, but this doesn't seem like the forum for that explanation.

And second, again, as an instructor, one of the bigger problems in the humanities is grade inflation and a sense of entitlement to A's. Whereas in a Calculus class, grading is much easier to quantify (i.e. get X number of questions right on a test, end up with Y grade), grading papers is a less standardized practice. The result is overwhelming grade inflation (I can't tell you the number of students I have who quite literally break down in tears when they receive B's). Perhaps both the utility of humanities degrees and the propensity for being willing to challenge oneself in a STEM course would be increased if getting higher grades wasn't perceived as being easier in the humanities.

[jseliger]

As a college level instructor, albeit of the grad student variety, I'd tend to agree and wrote a post on the grade inflation issue: http://jseliger.com/2011/04/02/grade-inflation-what-grade-in... . Basically, almost no one has an incentive at the institutional level. Professors are mostly rewarded for publishing; deans and other administrators for keeping students happy or at least not complaining; students and parents want high marks; and employers might want lower grade inflation but have little leverage.

So we get grade inflation. There are virtually zero rewards and many, substantial costs for me as an individual to reduce grade inflation in the classes I teach, and that's true of virtually everyone else.

[nekojima]

I found that while my CS studies were useful in setting up new software/internet ventures, it has been the research skills I learned from studying history & economics and the strategy & analysis from business management, that has made a world of difference in my success or failure as an entrepreneur & business owner.

[Fliko]

I don't know what school you went to, but the engineering school I went to put more of a focus on problem solving using relevant technology and as a result I know how to do very intense research, strategy building, and analysis from the constant nights of trying to build something after the teacher says "Here are x, y, and z components, now build this on Tuesday."

I would go as far to argue that the problem solving skills I've learned in my one year of studying at a technical institute far outweigh the problem solving skills you've learned in two years of study at your school.

I think the problem is bigger then liberal arts vs STEM, and has more to do with the kind of education students receive vs. what degree they are going with. I've switched to a community college very recently to pursue a math degree, but have found the education to be very dumb and drab, with the teachers giving you exact instructions on how to do everything, as opposed to my previous school's philosophy of learning the tools and then applying them by using your own brain.

[nekojima]

I went to the top CS uni in my country and its well-regarded internationally. Though CS and Engineering are two separate faculties and I dare say the problem solving skills taught in engineering courses were usually better.

I'd agree that skill development is far more important than degree and, along with attitude and perceived potential, its what I look for when recruiting new employees.

I've studied degrees in three countries on three continents (and taught at uni in two additional countries) and have found teaching style can destroy otherwise great potential in students. Usually the style reflects the country's perception of itself and will be tough to change. A great example is China and the hammering down of any student who sticks their head up too high to question the prof. I love being questioned and quizzed, but took weeks to get students to do this in China and was then told off by the head of faculty and the political censor. Even though they knew I'd do this when I started teaching and supposedly it was why I was hired.

[rlovelett]

I understand your premise and don't have any rebuttal to it that would include facts and/or figures. But one thought did pop into my mind when reading your comment.

I wonder if your feeling is a prevailing thought/sentiment among liberal arts professors. And if it is then why don't you and your ilk just give out more B's and C's? So what if they cry? If you think they deserve the B or C then that is the grade.

But what do I know I only have a degree in Electrical Engineering.

[neutronicus]

Because in a grade-inflated world, the professor who gives B's is doing a disproportionate amount of damage to his/her student's prospects. If you give a student who "does B work" by your standards a "B", you're actually denying that student the positive outcomes that would have accrued to a B student 50 years ago. Professors have to act in unison on this front, and even then, you're giving people who went to school 10 years ago an advantage.

[jseliger]

I understand your premise and don't have any rebuttal to it that would include facts and/or figures. But one thought did pop into my mind when reading your comment.

See the books Academically Adrift, Beer and Circus, The Marketplace of Ideas, and, to a lesser extent, the post I wrote above. Grade inflation is sufficiently well documented that most academics now take it for granted, especially because they see it in action.

[RoastBeats]

Have to agree with Neutronicus here. The prevailing example would be the "But I'll never get into med school/law school if you don't raise my B+ to an A-" argument which I hear at least three times a semester.

This gives us two solutions. First, is to convince naive kids that it's OK to be something other than a lawyer or doctor. Seriously, any students reading this comment, pay attention: There are plenty of other wonderful (and lucrative) professions in the world. If you genuinely care about medicine or law, you should certainly pursue those degrees. But if you're only concerned with career earnings and/or prestige, well, I have plenty of out-of-work lawyer friends.

Second, the academic industry (and it is an industry) needs to place less emphasis on grading and more on education.

I can hear the objections now: "Wait... you mean schools don't emphasize education?" Sigh... we'll save that for another discussion.

[neutronicus]

The problem is that assessment is a very valuable function of universities. Industry relies on them as a filter. I don't actually believe that industry values the training universities provide as much as it values the assessment it doesn't have to do because of universities.

The universities are thus in sort of a bind. They do an enormous amount of assessment, but the people who benefit the most from accurate assessment, namely industry, don't bear the costs of it. Their actual customers, the students who are ostensibly paying for an education, in essence demand an inaccurately positive assessment instead, because it achieves what an education achieves (get far enough in the door at a corporation that it would be a pain to fire you) with less labor input from the students.

The universities can't just stop focusing on assessment - like I said, I think it's actually more valuable than education. They need to be replaced by some industry-funded institution whose sole incentive is to provide accurate assessment.

[overgryphon]

Industry doesn't rely on GPA as a filter. They rely on interviews, past projects and work experience. Anything above a 3.0 (which is pretty low) and no need to worry.

The problem is with law school, medical school, and so forth. That is where GPA is seen as the ultimate-judge-of-worth rather than a mildly-interesting-but-completely-insignificant-number like it should be.