Reflections on Today's High School Reality
Last week, thanks to an acquaintance, I attended a career special lecture at a high school in Seoul. The students' career concerns were definitely more specific than in the past. Half the class had already set AI-related departments as their first choice, and the other half said they were thinking about starting a business or working abroad. It struck me that the distinction between liberal arts and sciences has long lost its meaning.
However, one thing made me uncomfortable: the students were casually accepting the phrase 'the liberal arts are dead.' As a humanities major, it was disheartening to hear, but that phrase has become reality now. The curriculum hasn't changed, but society has already moved on.
What I ultimately concluded is that what schools should teach is not knowledge but the 'ability to explore career paths.' If students had the chance to try out various jobs before choosing a major, they would be far less lost.
It was a day that gave me a lot, thanks to a special lecture after a long time. It made me think about how our generation is paying the price for wrong career choices.
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Yeah, I can really see the crowd all flocking to AI departments. My younger sibling is a sophomore in high school, and after seeing their career aptitude test results, they said, 'This is humanities, right?' and seemed to take being in the humanities as something to feel inferior about. ㅠ
But this 'liberal arts is dead' talk isn't something new... It was the same 10 years ago for me. It's not that the times have changed; the system teaching it just hasn't kept up.
So true lol. Why do they only start career special lectures in high school? If they'd let us try out different jobs since middle school, I probably wouldn't have wasted time on useless stuff either.
Well, it's good to emphasize career exploration skills, but is that all? In the end, I think it'll just widen the gap between kids depending on how well-informed their parents are.
Oh, I didn't know that. High schoolers these days are already thinking about starting their own businesses... impressive. When we were that age, we were just told to go to college.
If more than half the school has AI as their first choice, isn't that actually stranger? If everyone flocks in the same direction, it'll end up oversaturated just like the humanities did. It just feels like following a trend.
I agree with that. I studied liberal arts and it took me over a year to land a job. If I'd had proper career exploration back then, I wouldn't have kept switching jobs...
Eh, I'm not so sure about that. These days humanities fields are also seeing more interdisciplinary majors like big data and AI ethics. Saying 'the humanities are dead' is too simplistic.