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The stigma surrounding liberal arts

Applying liberal arts degrees in the working world

<p>UCS employee Everette Fortner leads a seminar for first and second years on translating skills learned with a liberal arts degree to the workplace. </p>

UCS employee Everette Fortner leads a seminar for first and second years on translating skills learned with a liberal arts degree to the workplace. 

University Career Services traditionally focuses on career fairs and resume workshops to prepare students for post-graduate life. However, Everette Fortner, associate vice president of career and professional development, has a new goal: instill confidence in students pursuing liberal arts degrees.

This year, Fortner led a seminar for the first time for first and second years on the value of a liberal arts education and how this learning translates to the workforce.

“What we are trying to convince liberal arts students is that only a good liberal arts education can give you this broad set of skills where you can look at a lot of data, look at differing points of views, look at global points of view [and] bring it all together,” Fortner said. “It lines up very well with what employers are asking for.”

Potential governmental allocation of funds to higher yielding science fields, pressure to obtain a job right after graduation, parental pressure and a changing employment landscape have created a stigma surrounding liberal arts degrees and a push toward science and technology careers, Fortner said.

“A liberal arts education does prepare you for the new emerging world of work as well as vocational education,” Fortner said. “Employers are demanding that students have critical analysis, communications and presentation skills [as well as] research skills… and these are the skills you get from a liberal arts education.”

UCS aims to further develop the skills students learn in class and help make them marketable to employers.

“What we are doing … is helping students recognize these skills and competencies that are translatable to many different kinds of jobs,” Fortner said. “We are trying to help students go to the career fair and talk to employers and understand what it is that employers need and how they can take the next two years of their career and develop those skills.”

Last year, College alumna Caroline Odom graduated from the University with a liberal arts degree in English and Art History. While aware of the stigma often associated with her degree, she said she was passionate about what she was studying.

“People love to talk about which majors guarantee a job right after graduation, but the truth is nothing does,” Odom said. “I based my decision on how I wanted to spend my time at U.Va., and that turned out to be reading, writing and talking about art.”

During her fourth year, Odom interned with the education department at the Fralin Art Museum.

“What I love is that the liberal arts are malleable,” Odom said. “Studying subjects like history, English [and] even arts administration can all feed into a better understanding of reaching people through content.”

Closer to graduation, Odom started interning with a creative writing non-profit, 826DC. Close to the end of her internship, Odom was offered the store and events coordinator position, which involves managing the organization’s fundraising events and revenue.

“Do I apply my knowledge of Gothic cathedral construction in this job? Nope,” Odom said. “But I do read critically, distill written content and make aesthetic judgments almost every day.”

Alumna Caroline Caldwell, meanwhlie, graduated from the University last year with a religious studies major and a bioethics minor.

“I've always been interested in the healthcare industry, so I felt a tremendous pressure to take the pre-med [or] science route,” Caldwell said. “Choosing a major associated with such an unclear career path caused me a huge amount of stress throughout my four years at U.Va.”

While thoughts of applying her major to a career initially worried Caldwell, she now works in healthcare consulting and said she values the foundation provided by her liberal arts degree.

“In earning a liberal arts degree, you are trained to be able to digest huge amounts of information and think critically about it in order to develop your opinion before creating a strategy for synthesizing that information and communicating it effectively and eloquently,” Caldwell said. “It's a process you don't even notice while it is happening, but one that it is so valuable as you move into the real world.”

Fourth-year College student Kiana Williams is currently studying anthropology and women, gender and sexuality at the University. While she said she initially found the science and technology fields appealing, she grew to enjoy the interactivity of the anthropology major and hopes to pursue a PhD in sociocultural anthropology.

“I do like the sciences [and] there is a lot of research that goes into anthropology,” Williams said. “But there is something about being able to do things very creatively and do the research however I want to do it and being able to interact with other people.”

And while students earning liberal arts degrees value the creative aspects of their careers, they do not always see liberal arts and science and technology as mutually exclusive.

“[In college I] learned that an interdisciplinary approach is often a really effective way to solve a problem,” Odom said. “I think it’s counterproductive to see the arts and sciences in some kind of antagonistic relationship, rather than what they are, which is intertwined.”

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