Hello Geology Majors,
I hope you are doing well and making it through the last full week of October for 2022. This semester really seems to be moving by quickly, and I find it difficult not to bounce through the things on my to-do list without given the broader implications a thought. This time of year, Priority Registration, is an important time to think about how your decisions could impact your future.
I know that many of you are working on what you plan to take around the courses that are required for your Geology major and Geology major ancillary requirements along with other majors and minors that you might be pursuing. You have a lot of options when it comes to your ACE and CDR requirements. Did you ever stop to consider why you are required to take general education courses? Here is what Lynn Pasquerella, president of the Association of American Colleges and Universities had to say about education and majors in an Inside Higher Ed Blog:
A student’s undergraduate experience, and how well the experience advances critical learning outcomes, is what matters most, with 80 percent of employers agreeing that all students need a strong foundation in the liberal arts and sciences. A liberal education fosters the capacity to write, speak and think with precision, coherence and clarity; to propose, construct and evaluate arguments; and to anticipate and respond to objections. And it offers what employers value the most: the ability to apply knowledge in real-world settings, to engage in ethical decision making and to work in teams on solving unscripted problems with people whose views differ from one’s own. In a globally interdependent yet multicultural world, it is precisely because employers place a particular premium on innovation in response to rapid change that they emphasize students’ experiences with diverse populations, rather than narrow technical training.
The data confirm what we already know: students in all undergraduate majors can and should gain the outcomes of a broad liberal education. This what your degree from the College of Arts and Sciences is designed to do along with making sure that you are proficient in the Geology major and Geology major ancillary courses required for your major. So please be thoughtful and mindful when selecting courses for those ACE and CDR requirements as you never know how useful they will be.
Best wishes, Doug
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