During the American Revolutionary War, John Adams, America’s 2nd president, wrote in a letter to his wife: I must study politics and war, that our sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. Our sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history and naval architecture, navigation, commerce and agriculture in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry and porcelain.”

And now, thanks to the industry and sacrifice of past generations, we have reached the last stage in Adams’ sequence, and even moved beyond – with young people in recent years even incurring staggering sums of debt in order to emerge from school with multiple degrees, including women’s studies, African-American studies, gender studies and generic degrees in “humanities.” Many of these same people are struggling badly in this economy, as their traditional jobs are shipped offshore, while student loans cannot generally be discharged in bankruptcy.

The total amount of outstanding student loan debt is now approaching a mind-boggling $1 trillion in the United States. Meanwhile, campuses are racing to attract students by building more and more amenities – turning them into 4 year resort areas with classrooms attached. Andrew Rosen, the CEO of Kaplan University, which specializes in online education, observes that the number of administrators now threatens to outstrip the number of faculty members.

The private sector – the source, ultimately, of all employment, public or private – rebelled long ago. Low-end manufacturing has already fled the country for Asia. College graduates leaving school with liberal arts degrees and degrees in soft sciences such as sociology and psychology are increasingly driven to fields well outside of their academic preparation, and even to relatively low-wage jobs in the service sector with limited career prospects, benefits or ability to advance. At the same time, employers in high-tech fields can’t get enough Americans with advanced skills in engineering, chemistry, medicine and biotechnology, and are importing thousands from China, Pakistan, India and the Middle East.

Winds of Change
Florida governor Rick Scott, a Republican, made headlines earlier this month, when he announced plans to reform the budget of the Florida state university system, increasing funding for math, science and engineering programs, at the expense of degree programs that just aren’t in demand.

“We’re spending a lot of money on education, and when you look at the results, it’s not great,” said the governor in an October 2011 speech in Tallahassee. “Do you want to use your tax money to educate more people who can’t get jobs in anthropology? I don’t.”

Scott’s opponents wryly pointed out that his own daughter studied anthropology. But the point stands: Owners of capital are not committing their investment dollars to construct homes for think tanks in anthropology and comparative literature. But they do shell out money to build technology parks, chemical and pharmaceutical plants. Case in point: Back in the 1950s, an American push to encourage young people to study the sciences and maintain a technological edge over the Soviet Union led to the growth of the Research Triangle in North Carolina. The educated and technically advanced work force the area’s universities were generating at the time attracted scores of employers, many of whom became Fortune 500 corporations. While much of the region, still dependent on traditional Carolina industries such as agriculture and textiles has been devastated by structural economic changes such as offshoring, employment and standards of living in the Research Triangle area remain strong. Ironically, these technology workers also support a thriving arts community – increasing prospects for humanities and fine arts majors right along with the engineers and architects.

If You Teach Them They Will Come
This is what Scott is after: An educated work force that walks into an employer’s door already possessing skills that the employer needs and values. A skilled engineer can always read up on sociology. But a trained sociologist cannot quickly develop the fundamental engineering skills to make his employer competitive in the global economy. If the work force is there, and well-prepared with marketable technical skills, the investment – and the jobs – will come.

Colleges themselves are beginning to respond – particularly at the small college and community college level. For example, Zane State, in Zanesville, Ohio, recently began programs specifically designed to prepare students to work in natural gas. Other colleges are following suit, creating partnerships and internship arrangements with employers across the country.

Two Workforces
Those looking forward to careers and to changes in careers now have a choice: They can elect to be in the group of workers who are attractive to profitable industries that are able to support and sustain high wages; or they can elect to join a work force that is powerless and will always be vulnerable to being replaced with lower-cost workers off shore as well as incoming immigrants.

John Adams had a terrific vision for America. But if we go too far toward studying painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry and porcelain, and our university students neglect the fields that enable the country to manufacture, produce and export, to develop domestic sources of energy, and to maintain a winning technological advantage over potential battlefield adversaries, then our children won’t have a ‘right’ to study any of these things.

They will, however, be studying more and more Chinese.

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