Virginia Tech is home to over 26,000 undergraduate students. With such a diverse group of students, why is it that Virginia Tech is known as a STEM school, or more specifically, an engineering school? As a Virginia Tech student myself, studying multimedia journalism, I’ve noticed a lacking in the liberal arts department.
According to Buddy Howell, a professor in the Department of Communication at Virginia Tech, part of this issue is the way the school was founded. Virginia Tech was founded as an all male military and land grant institution. “Why were we given land grants? To do agriculture and mechanical stuff. Agriculture and mechanical stuff moved into more of the formal sciences,” said Buddy Howell. This could explain why Virginia Tech is known mainly as an engineering school.
However, according to Buddy Howell, the sciences and liberal arts should go hand in hand. He goes on to say, “We live in a world of specialization, and there’s nothing wrong with specialization. I want to know that my neurosurgeon is a specialist. That specialization has created, for example are engineers that have a great engineering education but they can’t communicate.” You must be able to communicate in order to sell a business or an idea. In fact, Buddy Howell informed me that one of his former students went on to work for a construction company. The student did not work in construction, but instead handled the communication with the company’s clients. This goes to show that there is so much more that can be accomplished with a liberal arts degree.
To further investigate this unequal balance in Virginia Tech departments, I interviewed Emily Horvath, a junior at Virginia Tech. Emily is majoring in multimedia journalism and minoring in cinema, so one could say she’s well versed in the liberal arts department. According to Emily, the liberal arts department is beneficial in some ways and hindering in others. The department is beneficial because it creates an intimate atmosphere. In fact, Emily said “I have oddly close relationships with some of my professors, but I really think that helps my learning experience. The relationships I’ve made with some of my professors I think really impacts my learning ability. It makes me want to do better in the classes I take with them.”
On the other hand, Emily finds the liberal arts department lacking in funding. She struggles with broken equipment which ultimately, hinders her classroom experience. She believes that other departments, especially STEM departments, are given more funding and overall, seen as more important at Virginia Tech.
As you can see, the imbalance in departments is a real problem Virginia Tech faces. It makes the teaching more difficult, and the students feel less important. Buddy Howell said it best, “We in the liberal arts need to do a better job of saying that what we are doing is worthy of greater funding.” Nothing will change until Virginia Tech sees the importance and value in liberal arts.
Liberal Arts at Virginia Tech 