A liberal-arts college is a community for the development of intellectual and moral character through study, discourse, and practice.
The graduates of an excellent liberal-arts college are persons of great intellectual ability, character, and autonomy. They are knowledgeable, yet curious and open-minded. They think critically, proportioning their beliefs to the quality of the supporting evidence and reasoning. They are honest. They try always to act wisely and humanely, on the basis of sound and perspicacious judgement, a sympathetic understanding of the values and perspectives of others, and close attention to relevant facts and principles. They write clearly, fluently, logically, and persuasively, in their native languages, the language of the college, and one or more foreign languages.
Six types of graduates most strongly indicate the excellence of a college: scientists, artists, teachers, leaders, gadflies, and revolutionaries. An excellent liberal-arts college produces all six in substantial numbers.
The members of the faculty of an excellent liberal-arts college, sharing all of the characteristics of the graduates, are in addition scholars who take pleasure in intellectual life and can communicate its nature and significance to students. They have wide and diverse interests, and their conversations and casual writings are original and interesting. They are passionately dedicated to the intellectual and moral development of their students. They are meticulous in the performance of the professional responsibilities of teachers.
The students attending an excellent liberal-arts college are intelligent, eager, capable young persons, not all of the same social class or cultural origins. They are temperate or abstemious in their use of alcohol and other recreational drugs. They do not commit crimes of violence, hate crimes, or vandalism. They live on campus or close by, mostly in comfortably appointed and well-run residential halls rather than in fraternity or sorority houses. They are not employed outside the college, and if they work within the college it is only for a few hours a week.
The administration of an excellent liberal-arts college is dedicated to the education of students and directs its efforts to managing the college's resources so as to establish the conditions under which education can take place. It is small and has few of the trappings of a bureaucracy. It does not generate unnecessary paperwork for faculty, students, or staff. Administrators are academics rather than management types.
The curriculum of an excellent liberal-arts college includes history, philosophy, literature, art, music, mathematics, natural science, and classical and modern languages. Courses in other subjects may also be offered, reflecting the interests of the faculty and students.
An excellent liberal-arts college protects both free speech and academic freedom. Any topic, however controversial, may be discussed freely, openly, and without prejudice there.
Courses at an excellent liberal-arts college are taught by faculty members, not by students, graduate or undergraduate. Faculty members also assess and correct students' academic work and advise them on matters of curriculum.
The courses are quite rigorous. Standards are high. Faculty members clearly distinguish good work from poor work and do not accept light excuses for the latter.
The facilities of an excellent liberal-arts college are clean, well-lighted, quiet, and maintained at a comfortable temperature. Commercial advertising is neither visible nor audible anywhere on campus. The grounds are beautiful and well cared for.
Classrooms contain the equipment needed for lectures, discussions, demonstrations, performances, and laboratory work, as appropriate to the classes taught in them.
Each faculty member has an office, comfortably appointed and large enough for meetings with students. Faculty who engage in laboratory research have private labs, suitably equipped, according to the faculty member's style of teaching and research.
In each building that contains faculty offices and classrooms, there is at least one common room for informal conversations among students and faculty.
The college provides its members with convenient access to up-to-date, well-maintained computer systems and a reliable, fast connection to the Internet. In support of study and research (both by faculty and by students) and class work, it provides reprography and simple secretarial services.
The college publishes a newspaper, a literary review, and perhaps other periodicals of general interest. These publications are attractively designed, accurately written and edited, and generally of high quality. Students contribute most of the content.
An excellent liberal-arts college has a large library, wisely selected, with easy access to the stacks. It has a large bookstore stocked with a variety of scholarly books; the works of quack healers, astrologists, creationists, and the like are not prominently displayed.
An excellent liberal-arts college has a hospital at which students who contract minor illnesses or incur minor injuries are treated. Students who have contagious diseases can stay in rooms in the hospital until they are well.
An excellent liberal-arts college has modern facilities for physical training and intramural sports, but no intercollegiate athletics programs.
Excellent liberal-arts colleges do not form restrictive long-term relationships with corporations, especially those whose interests are contrary to those of students (e.g., textbook companies, manufacturers of standardized tests).
If they confer honorary degrees, the honorees are scholars or socially responsible public servants, not entertainers, athletes, business tycoons, or war criminals.
Excellent liberal-arts colleges do not raise money by cheapjack methods (e.g., telemarketing, lab and computer fees, corporate insignia on athletic uniforms).
An excellent liberal-arts college provides its students with a variety of occasions for learning outside the classroom, including performances, concerts, lectures, and faculty-student research projects. It supports programs for off-campus study and for socially responsible action both within the college community and beyond it.
created January 22, 1998
last revised February 23, 1998
published on the WWW February 2, 1998
new links added June 28, 1998