Universities exist as a means for students to further their education in a specific subject that interests them. Ideally, this would be a niche that feels worthwhile enough to structure an entire career around. However, economic implications and societal expectations have made this nearly impossible to achieve.
Fresh out of high school, students quickly sort themselves into majors known to have the highest return on investment (ROI), such as business, health and engineering. This decision, objectively, is the correct one. College prospects cite income as being their primary factor for attending college. These majors fulfill these criteria.
Ironically, it isn’t these students who regret their decision. They received exactly what they came for. It is those who pursue their passions who are left with feelings of regret. Humanities and arts majors top the list. Both students and society undervalue less practical majors. This creates a feedback loop that ultimately removes a cornerstone of culture from college campuses.
Economic Factors Influence Major Decisions
As the economy has increasingly failed to support college students, people’s views on the value of higher education have shifted. Students do not have the luxury to pursue an education in a field purely out of love for the subject. The price of college tuition has risen rapidly, shifting students to prioritize ROI. This fundamentally changed how majors are skewed, with humanities and arts taking the biggest hit.
It isn’t just these majors that suffer. College students across the board struggle to find job placement after graduation. Nearly half of college graduates end up underemployed, working in jobs unrelated to their field of study or that don’t require a four-year degree. Students’ decision to shift away from the liberal arts majors isn’t unjustified, but that doesn’t mean it is without consequence. These areas of study and their applications play pivotal roles in shaping how society is understood and engaged with.
Given the current structure of the economy, pursuing the arts is only practical for those with inherited wealth to rely on: individuals who don’t absorb the inherent risk of going into debt to pursue an arts degree. While income is not everything, it is certainly important. Those who can comfortably afford to study art can also afford to fail. Less financially stable individuals don’t have access to the same safety net and are only getting one opportunity to succeed. It’s reasonable that students are shying away from that leap of faith.
Art has unquantifiable social value, yet aspiring artists are treated less than human. Financially, artists struggle to support themselves, reinforcing the idea of the starving artist. The humanities are equally as valuable, but career salaries of humanities majors often lag behind their peers in other disciplines.
There is no all-encompassing way to assign a numerical value to art, it’s a matter of individual perception. Without maximizing shareholder value, which lies at the core of other career fields, artists are cast aside as a non-pivotal subset of society.
Rethinking Success in Higher Education
The perceived value of college has continued to drop as more and more graduates are left stranded upon completing their education. College enrollment has fallen alongside this trend.
As students observe this and filter themselves into the majors considered more practical, landing a position in the field only becomes more competitive. Even computer science, a major that has historically been the poster child for practicality, has struggled to help students find a well-paying job. The more students funnel into business or engineering majors, the more impractical they become.
Higher education will only survive if it adapts to shifting economic conditions impacting the decisions of students. Rising tuition costs combined with dropping ROI do nothing to motivate potential students to attend. Without this change, it becomes difficult to dissuade anyone from falling into the now-infamous mantra that college itself is a scam.
Shifting Priorities
Restructuring how higher education is perceived is a complex issue that cannot be solved by just one party. It must come with a cultural shift in all areas. It’s important to remember that just because certain skills are undervalued by the economy doesn’t mean they lack importance.
Practical majors like engineering and business teach the students the how, while art and the humanities teach them the why. These are equally valuable and should be recognized as such.
This change begins with enabling the practical implications of pursuing more niche fields of study. Until the inherent risk can be eliminated, students will continue to be forced into careers they ultimately regret.
