Liberal Arts at the Brink (review)

While liberal arts colleges account for only 2 percent of the total college enrollment in the United States, the image of the liberal arts campus is now synonymous with higher education as a whole. College is imagined as the student wandering a bucolic campus, learning from dedicated teachers, and experiencing residential living—all hallmarks of a liberal arts college. Yet education at liberal arts colleges is under attack. Most institutions face increasing competition for a limited pool of students, operate with undersized endowments, live with the financial drain of facility- and teaching-heavy environs, and exist with confusion over what defines the liberal arts. Put simply, liberal arts institutions face enormous challenges. Victor Ferrall Jr.’s book Liberal Arts at the Brink examines the obstacles facing liberal arts colleges today, as well as the role they play in U.S. society.

Ferrall’s thesis is simple: liberal arts colleges are worth saving. In his words, “Society needs well and broadly educated citizens. . . . Liberal arts colleges, while not the only vehicles for producing liberally educated citizens are among the best” (16). Using the 2009 U.S. News and World Report list of the “Best Liberal Arts Colleges,” Ferrall looks at 225 private liberal arts colleges divided into four tiers based on ranking. Examining these institutions, Ferrall identifies a number of challenges faced universally by liberal arts colleges, including a failed budget model, decreased demand for a liberal arts education, increased competition among peer institutions for the same students, curriculum design, and an inability to develop cooperative strategies.

Using specific examples from liberal arts colleges as well as data from 225 liberal arts colleges compiled from the Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics, he looks at internal and external barriers to the long-term success of liberal arts colleges. These barriers include limited finances, the increasing vocationalization of the undergraduate education, and the obstacle of infusing an understanding of the goals and mission of the liberal arts education into societal discourse. Ferrall paints a picture of David versus Goliath, with liberal arts colleges fighting for their survival against the behemoth that research universities have become, as well as the rapid rise of for-profit colleges in the United States. What becomes apparent in Ferrall’s discussion is that research institutions and for-profit colleges would benefit from becoming more liberal-arts-like in their culture and structure.

Ferrall defines liberal arts in two distinct ways, as an institution and as an ideal. For most people in the United States, the liberal arts is viewed as a small, residential college with caring faculty and staff who are committed to teaching over research and educating the whole student (18). Yet the liberal arts as an ideal is larger, and Ferrall challenges his reader to look at the core concepts of the liberal arts: a sense of intimacy in education, a community where learning is a value in and of itself, where curiosity, creativity, and questioning are celebrated. These are the concepts that make the liberal arts so important to a democratic society.

While Ferrall’s focus is on the liberal arts, many of his critiques of the role of teaching, tenure, publication, and the goals of education are universal and can be broadly applied across higher education. Is the goal of higher education to prepare students for a singular job, or is it to help students acquire the core knowledge and skills allowing them success no matter their life path? Ferrall passionately argues, “Learning is of value in and of itself, without regard to whether it is directly linked to a marketable skill” (18).

While Ferrall does a good job discussing the importance of academic faculty to the liberal arts, he ignores the role played by other college personnel. Today’s liberal arts colleges have vibrant out-of-class curricula that enhance student learning and support the core tenets of the liberal arts. By not discussing the role played by other areas within...