[cyang08]

I couldn't agree more. Steve Jobs is an interesting example in this case - although he dropped out, he credited a random calligraphy class as the inspiration for some of the Mac's beautiful typography:

"Because I had dropped out and didn’t have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and sans-serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture, and I found it fascinating.

"None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But 10 years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography."

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/06/steve-jobs-designer...

[enraged_camel]

My sister is currently in college. The other day she was complaining about having to take classes outside her major to graduate. I made her watch the video of that speech and her opinion changed completely.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF8uR6Z6KLc