A design for life Alison Bissell, Director of A-list Education

A design for life

The American liberal arts system provides students with a wealth of opportunities to discover who they are, says Alison Bissell, Director of A-list Education, part of the Dukes family

American liberal arts colleges are increasingly popular with families in the UK who recognise the enormous benefits of the flexible liberal arts system which offers students breadth, exploration and personal discovery.

“A US liberal arts education is all about choices, giving students the freedom and opportunities to explore and learn,” says Loutfi Jirari, Assistant Vice President for International Enrolment at DePauw University, Indiana.

Jirari was born in Morocco. When he enrolled in university in his homeland, where all higher education is still run on the French system, he discovered rigidity and boredom. He lasted just one year before moving to the US where he eventually achieved the liberal arts education he wanted. His job is now about helping students from around the world achieve the same thing.

A liberal arts degree is a particularly American thing; it offers an expansive intellectual grounding in all kinds of humanistic enquiry. By exploring issues, ideas and methods across the humanities, the arts and the natural and social sciences, students learn to read critically, write cogently and

‘A liberal arts education is about giving students the freedom to explore and learn’

think broadly. It gives students endless opportunity to discover who they are and what they want to be.

DePauw is small, with just 600 students enrolled per year. These students will choose from a vast smorgasbord of subject choices within the time span of their four-year degree. The liberal arts system does not require specialisation; a student will major in one or two subjects but study a host of others. It is not uncommon to see students mixing science with humanities, or science and the arts. You could choose to major in Computer Science and also take Jazz Studies and English Literature at DePauw if you wish.

DePauw goes one step further than this, allowing students to choose their own tutor, giving them the opportunity to pick someone they have made a connection with or a tutor who has a similar field of interest to them. Students don’t just design their own degree but can choose who teaches it to them.

There is also a huge range of extracurricular opportunities for students, says Jirari. “The strength in the US system versus the UK system is all the extra experience,” he says. There are research openings and internships on offer, plus wider activities such as running a social society. “The UK appears to be more narrowly academic; grades seem to matter a lot when looking at applicants,” says Jirari. “When I look at applicants for DePauw I’m looking at the applicant in the round, the whole of their knowledge and experience.”

In addition to the wide subject choice and external opportunities, nearly all DePauw students — 94% a year — spend time studying abroad, for as little as a semester or as much as a year.

The result of this broad education means that by the time students finish their degree “they are confident and worldly”, say Jirari, noting that “companies like students who have been educated at a liberal arts university. They know the students will write well, that their soft skills will be polished.”

The liberal arts system is now followed the world over — you can now find the idea of ‘discovery’ at the heart of many other university systems. Here is a selection of universities that foreground exploration and discovery in their offering:

‘It is not uncommon to see a student taking Computer Science with Jazz Studies at DePauw’

1. Discovery through individuality: Grinnell College, Iowa, exemplifies discovery through their Individually Advised Curriculum. Students shake a kaleidoscope of 500 course offerings and experience a truly distinctive education. The only required class is their First-Year Tutorial which can focus on myriad topics from Kendrick Lamar to Climate Change.

2. Discovery through emerging fields: Ivy League university, Brown, also promotes discovery through its Independent Concentration Program where exceptional students are encouraged to forge a new academic path for themselves. Where relevant, students are supported to pursue and develop new fields of study, such as Educational Neuroscience, for example. 3. Discovery through exploration without boundaries: Nurturing interdisciplinary connections is central to the ethos of Olin College of Engineering in Massachusetts. Unlike most universities, Olin is not divided into distinct academic departments; correspondingly, undergraduates are encouraged to take an integrated approach to their studies and explore the relationships between the branches of science, as well as arts, humanities, and social sciences. Olin also adopts the ‘do-learn’ approach to classes — students are afforded the space to experiment with concepts before studying the formal theory behind them.

4. Discovery through free and collaborative creativity: Emerson College, also in Massachusetts, describes itself as a ‘creative force’. The selection process leans heavily on the school’s core values of leadership, communication, and collaboration, thereby fuelling a community which comes together to lead creative and social change.

‘The result of this broad education means that by the time students finish their degree “they are confident and worldly”’

5. Discovery through choice: Most university courses consist of a combination of compulsory and optional modules. However, the University of Leeds goes one step further with its offering of ‘discovery modules’. These are organised across various themes and allow students to venture outside of the borders of their degree discipline, discovering academic ideas from areas such sustainability, philosophy, or languages. University College Dublin also utilises discovery modules to expose students to new electives, which span multiple departments and cover globally significant issues such as global development, scientific revolutions, and climate change.

6. Discovery through international exposure: The World Bachelor in Business program is run by three leading universities: Bocconi University in Milan, the University of Southern California in the US, and the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. Not only do students traverse the world to experience each campus for a year, but they are also awarded three degrees. There are many other programmes which adopt this model and leverage the power of two or more institutional brand names, facilities, and cultural settings. 7. Discovery through diverse thinking: We were delighted to have the support of The Engineering & Design Institute (TEDI) for our inaugural Sustainable Careers Week at Dukes. TEDI is another example of a university which is committed to discovery via a project-based, interdisciplinary approach. In addition, they also incubate innovation by curating a diverse student body. TEDI achieves this through a flexible admissions process; rather than demanding candidates apply with traditional qualifications, Maths and Physics A-level are not specifically required, for example. Candidates are assessed for suitability in a more holistic and individualised way — via tests and interviews. n