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While it’s easy to tell quite a bit about somebody from their major, it’s often hard to pin down the characteristics of liberal arts students. Nursing majors are interested in nursing and helping people, and math students tend to be good with numbers. Liberal arts students may be a little harder to figure out, but there are a few characteristics that most of them have in common.
Little Interest in Vocational and Technical Education
There are a lot of schools and programs out there that focus on vocational training. While this type of education is great for some individuals, it’s not the greatest plan for most liberal arts students. One of the characteristics of liberal arts students is that most of them do not want to enter a technical field. Learning about cars or cooking might be fun for them, but they usually don’t want to work as mechanics or chefs. According to Wikipedia, there are many subjects that are associated with the liberal arts. These subjects are more likely to interest liberal arts students and include academic areas such as:
- visual arts
- history
- languages
- literature
- math
- music
- philosophy
- psychology
- natural sciences
- performing arts
Interest in Different Academic Areas
Being interested in many of the subjects listed above is another one of the characteristics of liberal arts students. While history is often considered a liberal arts subject, a history major is still a history major. A liberal arts major, however, picks subjects from several different areas. Many schools prefer liberal arts students to concentrate on three areas of study. This means that someone who plays piano, loves math and is interested in learning Spanish could combine his or her interests and become a liberal arts major to study all three subjects instead of having to choose one major or a major and a minor.
Learning for the Sake of Learning
Of all the characteristics of liberal arts students, this is perhaps the most controversial. Some people believe that all college students should have concrete career goals before enrolling in an academic program, but others think that learning in and of itself is a desirable goal. While a liberal arts student can have a specific goal in mind, many of them simply love learning for the sake of learning. This may be why they also tend to take courses in different academic areas and prefer to study subjects like math and sociology instead of trying to learn vocational skills. Even though a liberal arts degree may not be the best option for a student who wants a specific career, it can help him or her get many different kinds of jobs after college and prepare the student for graduate studies.
People majoring in the same subject tend to have similar characteristics. While every student is different and has different goals, students who are interested in academic studies, want to learn about different things and like learning for the sake of learning have characteristics of liberal arts students.
Related Resource: Liberal Arts Majors
