Editorial: Interdisciplinary studies are important

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Editorial Board | FIUSM

opinion@fiusm.com

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It was a great day to be a Panther when FIU won the rights to expand the University to the Fairgrounds. This, of course, applies only to STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) majors.

If you are a student within the College of Architecture + The Arts, then this expansion is just another nail in the coffin for your program. In fact, if you belong to any program that didn’t benefit directly from the creation of the newest medical buildings on campus or the future blueprints of our campus then you’re definitely not going to see improvements any time soon.

Don’t get it twisted. We understand that there is a lot more than meets the eye to this particular situation.

As students of this University, we want what’s best for everybody. Unfortunately, in undertaking this noble act of making renovations for certain departments, it seems that the ones with a lucrative label are the ones that are given priority.

Majoring in a STEM field should not mean that one’s academic endeavors are of a higher quality than those of a student majoring in a liberal arts discipline. Interestingly enough, there are people who possess a superiority complex, considering that their majoring in a discipline that calls for high-level skills in mathematics and science warrants privilege.

Consider the case of an English major. A serious student of literature may not have to expend his or her mental faculties trying to solve a thirteen-step mathematical equation, but he or she must still share a specific skill with a STEM major: analytical abilities.

A major such as English requires much more than just reading a book and typing a report on it. The major requires that students look deeper into the text by analyzing the complex political, social and historical subject matter that permeate the text.

While STEM majors are normally concerned with practicality, liberal arts majors are concerned with ideas, particularly their potential to be applied to virtually all disciplines to initiate a dialogue that actively examines different aspects of society.

There should never be an instance where a college student should feel like their major or passion is not respected or valued. There is a necessity behind this wide variety of subjects offered in both public and private universities.

Liberal arts courses can teach us skills that are key to being successful in our expanding job market. We learn how to communicate effectively through different channels, think of innovative ideas and how to adapt in a world that is always changing by looking at it through different lenses.

Politicians, activists and business moguls are just a few of the influential career choices that are bred from this kind of knowledge. To deny the importance of professions like these is also denying how integrated things like politics, human rights and the economy are in our daily lives.

Instead of being at war about who makes more money or who is a more “important” member of society, we should be looking forward to how these disciplines will cross paths and take us to newer heights.

With globalization and the growth of technology, this balance needs to happen sooner rather than later. Social media is a perfect example of this since sociological and psychological concepts are considered when addressing how the public will interact with this technology.

Huge corporations like Apple can create a product that can be made for maybe a few dollars here and there but it is marketing executives that can sell it for a bigger profit.

On the larger scale of things, we all have the right to choose what our life purpose is, and anyone that tries to shame that should re-evaluate their own path.

The point is, your major is powerfully relevant and we as students should take pride in them.