The False Choice between the Liberal Arts and Vocational Training

James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal ^ | July 24, 2026 | Adam Smith

[karpov]

Anybody who still believes in the liberal arts believes that higher education exists for a higher purpose than putting graduates in jobs. At the same time, even the truest believer has to grapple with the real harm done to graduates who can’t get the jobs they need to pay for that education. In the face of perpetually rising costs and ballooning student debt, it’s hard to keep the faith.

One response is to decouple higher education from the liberal arts tradition and reduce it to professional preparation. Several state legislatures have recently passed bills pushing public universities to cut programs with low enrollments or tying funding to job placement rates. Many faculty are understandably opposed to such moves, and in part, this is a fight about ideology. But in truth, these bills are only a push toward the edge of a cliff that universities have been running towards for some time. General education was already being crowded out by other priorities. Most students matriculate with no understanding of its purpose and a firm sense that it’s a waste of time – a hoop to jump through before they get to their major. Faculty in professional programs often feel the same, and their students have little room in their schedules to explore. Part of the blame lies on humanities professors themselves, who are often so focused on hyperspecialized research that they neither can nor want to spend their time contributing to the broad education of a bunch of 18-year-olds, or so committed to making the humanities “socially useful” that they have made themselves useless as mentors of citizens.

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TOPICS: Business/Economy; Education
KEYWORDS: college

[spintreebob]

“Part of the blame lies on humanities professors, who are often focused on hyperspecialized research”

And part of the blame is on K-12 that does a poor job of covering the history, reading, grammar, literature, basic math (logic) that a highschool grad should know.

It is tough to teach a college class when 50% of college freshmen have a 4th grade (or lower) reading and vocabulary level.

[Bob Wills is still the king]

Vocational education has largely shifted to Community Colleges around the country. An Associates Degree or Certificate of completion for many trades begins there.

Locally, our Community Colleges train diesel and heavy equipment mechanics, chefs, nurses, respiratory therapists, police officers, fire fighters, electricians, HVAC techs, etc. Those wanting to be called “Journeyman” enter OJT programs during or after their CC work.

[Bob Wills is still the king]

“It is tough to teach a college class when 50% of college freshmen have a 4th grade (or lower) reading and vocabulary level.”
____________________________________________________________

In addition to lower reading and vocabulary levels, I’ve had many college graduates who simply could not do basic business or expository writing. That severely limits their future options.

[BenLurkin]

Not very many “Anthropologist Wanted” in the classified section.

[V_TWIN]

My career was in the aviation maintenance trade and I was able to retire at 59 1/2 with enough for my wife and I to live on for the rest of our lives.

We own our home and two fairly new vehicles free and clear and have zero credit debt.

I do not have and have never had any regrets about skipping college.

[Jamestown1630]

I worked in higher ed for decades; the education levels of many of the high school kids I saw getting into college in the late 1990s was downright scary. It wasn’t just reading ability; in many cases, a lot of them didn’t even understand how aspects of the world they live in really operate. (Not to mention anything of higher culture than pop music.)

They had about half the education that we who entered public school in the 1950s and 1960s received.

And now we’re reaping the result of that.

[bigbob]

I was (and still am) interested in both academics and hands-on learning. Served me well. I had a unique combination of skills but I had to follow my own instincts to pull what I wanted from available offerings. Pigeon-holing and one-size-fits-all never worked for me.

[Equine1952]

What did you pay for your work degree?

[GingisK]

It IS a valid choice. One should choose using appropriate criteria.

Universities were not originally created to prepare for any career. They were created to educate "the whole man", usually limited to people who were already well to do.

The purpose of universities was corrupted once a degree was used to choose among job applicants.

[Jamestown1630]

I’ve heard Mike Rowe suggest that it doesn’t have to be a choice. Nothing stops anyone who wants a ‘whole man’ education from getting one, even if he starts his work life in a trade. We have our whole lives to obtain ‘education’ - really, we should never STOP pursuing it.

[ClearCase_guy]

My undergrad degree is a BA in history from the 1970s. Even way back then, the professors were explicit that history was about the French Revolution (first socialist revolution) and Karl Marx (revolutionary theory perfected) and Freud (it’s always all about sex). Everything in history had to be seen in some reference to these big three. Foucault was lesser, but he was also important.

That’s a tainted way to see history, and that was almost 50 years ago. It has only gotten worse.

Universities, going waaaaay back existed to train men for the clergy. As the Church faded in importance, universities became a “finishing school” for upper class gentlemen who studied the liberal arts to acquire culture.

It was only after WWII that people began to go to college to further their careers. And it took decades for people to really grasp that degrees in history, English, political science, sociology, and lesbian dance theory, do not really lead to lucrative careers.

If you have a trust fund, then I suggest staying at home and reading many Great Books so that you can be cultured. If you do not have a trust fund, and are seeking a lucrative career, then I suggest focusing on vocational opportunities, perhaps while serving in the military. College won’t give you anything useful these days.

[LexBaird]

Part of the blame lies on humanities professors themselves, who are often so focused on hyperspecialized research that they neither can nor want to spend their time contributing to the broad education of a bunch of 18-year-olds...

I suppose 90% is "part of the blame". The "hyperspecialized research" in most liberal arts departments consists of "deconstructing" classic education and inserting whatever grievance studies program they are pushing.

Arday wasn't an aberration. He was a representation of today's mainstream Academia.

[Ronald77]

Vocational training is a great idea, let’s train tomorrows welders, carpenders, masons etc when they complete they’ll at least have a good paying job.
Not a wasted education.

[V_TWIN]

Not sure I totally understand your question but I went to junior college to become a machinist but changed my mind.

A very reputable and well known aerospace company offered a no cost entry level training program in 1982 and I jumped on it.

Fast forward to 2019 and I retired.

Bottom line.....God is good.....every day! 👍🙏✝️

[Maine Mariner]

Same here. I earned an MA in economics from the University of Chicago while working on American flagged merchant ships, iron-ore bulk carriers on the Great Lakes. I also earned my deck officers license and taught economics and other courses at the maritime college in Maine. I was fortunate to be in two professions that I love.

[Fledermaus]

It’s been bad for 60 years. I entered college in 1977. So many freshmen had to take remedial courses.

I took Clep (?) tests for credit as a prerequisite and went straight to level 2 classes. By my third year I was at level though. Calc 3 got me.

[GingisK]

I’m with you, 100%.

[Terry L Smith]

Before I retired in 2009, I was under contract as a “computer aide”, helping everybody that came through the state job center in the mechanixations of cree
sting online accoun0ts, resumes, and job searches. There was a college graduation from ‘state college’, who could not fill out a resume! “What did you d.o when you worked at :c?’. “ I cut wood.” ‘Ok, how? What tools did uou use? What did you cut the wood for? What type of wood?”The graduate would answer my questions, but could not connect those answers to a job description space of the online resume format.

[KarlInOhio]

In the publish or perish world you have to find something new to publish. In the sciences, you can stand on the shoulders of giants and reach just a bit further for what is new. In the liberal arts, it is just easier to cut down the giant and display his head as a trophy. Or just make stuff up.