In a world in which higher
education is increasingly thought as preparation for a profession, being multidisciplinary
in college and especially in graduate school is decreasingly sought and valued by
students at universities in the United States. Unlike in the E.U., where it is
more common for the professional schools to be separate from universities given
the difference between training and education—skills and knowledge—American universities
make it institutionally possible for a person to get a MBA and MPA after a BA
in liberal arts or a BS in natural science, or, less commonly, to get a MBA degree
and a MDiv degree after having studied in the liberal arts and sciences. The MBA
and LLB or JD has been a more popular combination, and I spoke once with a MPA
student at Harvard who already had a MBA from Notre Dame and was considering a
degree in law. I think the benefits vocationally from being multidisciplinary
in one’s formal higher education (i.e., college and graduate school) tend to
kick in only after a few decades after one’s final graduation. Perhaps only in
retrospect does the traces of such an education reveal themselves in a person’s
work-life. I contend that the political aide, pastor, and journalist, Bill
Moyers, is an excellent example of how a multidisciplinary education can enrich
a person’s career, which is not likely to stay “inside the lines” of one
particular industry. This is not a bad thing.
The full essay is at "Bill Moyers."
