To the editor,

I am incredibly discouraged to find that the liberal arts are being devalued so heavily by our administration. To take away Spanish’s status as a major is to go completely against the global mission Marywood has undertaken. How can students ever hope to be global-minded if they cannot speak the languages of other countries?

Cuts are being conducted under the justification of budgetary concerns, which is understandable given the financial state of the university. I fail to see, though, how cutting the Spanish, Religious Studies, and Philosophy majors will help shore up funds. These disciplines are still part of the core and still have minor programs, which means they will continue offering the same courses. Therefore, no money is being recuperated by eliminating their degree programs.

The only explanation I can conceive of is that the university is preparing to make cuts to its core curriculum. A revamping of the core was obliquely mentioned in the SRA report, though the details of that process were not. Because the financial reasoning behind eliminating the aforementioned majors is shaky, I would postulate that their elimination is a way to ease into cutting them from the core. This would be a detrimental mistake.

Classes in the humanities teach more than the names of philosophers or how to say “chair” in another language—they teach students how to digest information, transform it, and apply it to novel situations. They teach students how to write, communicate and think critically. In essence, they teach students how to be better students—and people. All Marywood students deserve that experience; they deserve to receive an education that is as well-rounded and deep as the world into which they will enter post-graduation. To deprive them of that by way of eliminating classes in the liberal arts core is to do them a massive disservice in their future endeavors.

Sincerely,
Megan McDonnell
Marywood Master’s Student