Marymount U. in Virginia Eliminating 10 Degree Programs Citing Low Interest
“The impacted majors are rarely selected by Marymount students and, in fact, have only graduated a handful of students in the past decade.”
Check out the programs being cut below. There are some surprising choices.
From FOX News via MSN:
Virginia’s Marymount University eliminates 10 degree programs, including theology, after low interest
Despite significant pushback from current and former students, Marymount University in northern Virginia announced Friday it voted to get rid of 10 of its degree programs.
The Board of Trustees at the Catholic university, located in Arlington, voted 20-0 in favor of removing nine undergraduate majors and one graduate program due to low interest. Those eliminated are as follows: B.A. Art, B.A. Economics, B.A. English, B.A. History, B.S. Mathematics, B.A. Philosophy, B.A. Secondary Education, B.A. Sociology, B.A. Theology & Religious Studies, and M.A. English & Humanities.
The university said the programs taken away were “no longer serving Marymount students” in a letter obtained by FOX 5 DC Friday.
“The impacted majors are rarely selected by Marymount students and, in fact, have only graduated a handful of students in the past decade. This decision reflects not only our students’ needs, but our responsibility to prepare them for the fulfilling, in-demand careers of the future,” the letter read.
As of Friday, there are 74 total students seeking degrees in the 10 programs – 22 of whom will graduate in May. The remaining 52 students will be able to complete their degrees, but no other students will be admitted into the programs going forward.
The university said students will still be required to study the subjects as part of Marymount’s core liberal arts curriculum, and faculty in the eliminated programs will continue to teach the courses.
Earlier in the week, a spokesperson for Marymount told Fox News Digital that the university “will reallocate resources from those programs to others that better serve our students and reflect their interests,” adding that the elimination of the majors are supported by “definitive research and a Faculty Advisory Committee, the Academic Policy, Budget and Planning (APBP) Committee.”
The school said the plan is not “not financially driven,” and “will provide the University the opportunity to redeploy resources to better serve students and areas of growth.”
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Comments
I am happy that some Humanities and Social Sciences are being eliminated since I am sure word has gotten out that they are indoctrination, but am surprised that economics had few takers, unless they have a business major.
I am also not surprised, but a bit saddened, that Math is being eliminated. However, less selective schools do not tend to get STEM-oriented students.
I’m not (and I have B.Math degree). A mathematics degree qua a mathematics degree really only qualifies one to teach mathematics. It’s applied mathematics – also known as engineering, physics and the hard sciences – that’s useful in the real world.
There are only a handful of universities in the world where it’s worth getting a degree in mathematics, and only if you’re planning on going into a career in research.
Not quite correct. A traditional math degree is quite good preparation to pass some of the exams to become a “Fellow” of the Society of Actuaries and get a job as an Actuary, with an average base salary of about $175K, and potential for much more in higher management. But, there are only about 30K “Fellows” of the SoA.
That students at a name Catholic school show no interest in Theology and Religious Studies is a bit of an eye-opener.
Curious that student interest drives this. In the extreme at a “research university”, departments and scholars within them generate their own revenue and reputation from research, while students, esp undergrads, are at best annoying distractions.
Read about this Friday. Marymount is my daughter’s alma mater where she earned a degree in Theology, minor in Psychology, in 2010. She went on to get a doctorate in Psychology (elsewhere).
As a chemistry major who went into medicine I had often questioned the value of Liberal Arts majors. However her liberal arts background served her quite well, focusing on writing, reasoning, critical thinking and analysis.
It is sad that Marymount, which was founded by the Religious of the Sacred Heart of Mary, no longer offers a degree in Theology.
It is sad to see the elimination of most of the true liberal arts, but we all realize that those programs were hardest hit by leftism, really starting with the influx of frankfurt school acolytes in the early 20th C. So it isn’t as if a great edifice of learning is being torn down. That happened a long time ago.
But so-called higher education was established to replenish academia primarily, not to serve as a jobs training program. it is sad to see nearly every liberal arts institution go STEM-addled because parents want little Maddie/Paris/Isabella or Hunter/Tanner/Gatherer to graduate in “science;” the dark reality is most will probably work unhappily in a cubicle just long enough to learn their job so that they can efficiently train their H-1B replacement.
Of course higher ed has indeed bought into job training as core mission rather than education. And it has done so as a means of survival. But if you’re going to do job training the right way, then the resources being repurposed in these institutions to small “STEM” programs of uneven quality would be far better directed to the teaching of real-world salable skills like plumbing, electrical, welding, auto repair, construction, and agriculture. Maybe 1 in 10 belong in what has been understood as higher education. The rest are communications majors or worse, and would live better lives doing something with real-world application.
Look at the bigger picture. College enrollment peaked in the last decade, and now is significantly lower and headed down further. The long-predicted shakeout in higher ed is nigh. “Liberal arts colleges, may you live in interesting times.”