The Importance Of Liberal Arts Education

Submitted By Lindseyleedavis
Words: 645
Pages: 3

Knowledge is Power. Being able to think critically and be independent is the key to success in life. Technical skills are not enough anymore; employers look for applicants that have the ability to think, reason and act. These concepts are the building blocks for a liberal arts education. These blocks are a solid foundation and allow students to use them as launch pads for bigger and better things. A student who can inquire, explore, conclude, persuade and engage is a lot better off than one who just regurgitates facts; because that is not really knowing, that is memorizing. In St. Thomas’ Aquinas; Summa Theologica education is treated very differently; there is no freedom to learn what you want but simply what the school leaders think you should learn. When given a choice between a modern liberal arts education and The Medieval University; I would pick the modern education every time because I believe it is important to be exposed to everything because the more one experiences; both good and bad the better off they are. The Medieval University headed by Thomas Aquinas had one goal; to use science to prove that god does in fact, exist. To distinguish between what is real and what is not; and although the wording may be different the building blocks are the same. For Aquinas; his building blocks are General Grammar, Formal logic and Rhetoric; which is simply searching for fact and organizing them, eliminating the fictitious ones and communicating using the facts. The only problem that arises is the only thing that a student in the Medieval University is only allowed to talk about one thing; God. It is not allowed to use the knowledge learned at the University for anything else. Although the building blocks are the same; the use of them is completely different. For one reason, students at the University are limited. It is difficult to have someone tell you to go out and explore and search for the truth and then have someone tell what you can and cannot do. Once someone tells me to go out and find the truth; I am not going to stop at just one thing; I am going to keep going. A Liberal Arts education is on the complete opposite side of the spectrum. Even though the building blocks are the same the execution of teachings are not similar at all. The foundation of a liberal education is to inquire, explore, conclude, persuade and engage; and to use