As entry-level job opportunities constrict, tuition costs rise, and AI threatens to disrupt the entire world, questions about the value of a liberal arts degree have intensified. I recently spoke with our client, Christa Acampora, dean of the College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences at University of Virginia, about the state of higher education. We also talked about the job prospects for liberal arts majors, and why the humanities increasingly matter in an AI world.
Celia Jones: As dean of one of the nation’s most respected arts and sciences institutions, how concerned are you about the questions regarding the value of a college degree in today’s world?
Christa Acampora: Every education leader should be concerned about the state of higher education, public confidence, and the debates around the cost of attendance. Many challenges are hitting higher education and the workforce at the same time. We are at an inflection point.
AI—an umbrella term for many different technologies—is not a “normal” technology, where an innovation emerges, the marketplace integrates, and a skilled-worker gap appears that higher education fills. If it were a normal technology, or just one technology, it might be smart to become an expert in only that.
Since it’s unclear if AI will create a job boom, it’s important to look at why studying matters—rather than the fields to study—and think about the purpose and value of higher education.
Jones: How do you counter the narrative that going to college isn’t worth the investment, or that it’s a financial risk?
Acampora: I’d encourage people to look at the data, which strongly show college-educated workers fare better than those without a degree, almost universally across fields of study. They make more money, have better health outcomes, and live longer. From a holistic lifespan perspective, college is worth it.
Jones: Let’s talk about careers. My diverse job experiences were highly influenced by exposure to so many different ideas via my liberal arts curriculum. How can we socialize such pathways to students considering college or navigating life afterward?
Acampora: Even when I talk to parents, they want to understand what kind of jobs align with a history major. Yet, if you ask them what they studied and how they ended up where they are, their pathways took all kinds of twists and turns. I studied philosophy and became a philosopher, but I worked in advertising and marketing first because I liked creative work. I realized I enjoyed thinking about big ideas, fitting them together, and talking to people about them, which led me into academic administration and leadership.
We need to prepare students, not just by sharing inspirational stories, but equipping them to build their own paths. In such a dynamic social, cultural, and technological transformation, what could be more important than figuring out what you care about, why you care about it, and then incorporating that into your pursuit of a life worth living?
Jones: Let’s talk about agency and how UVA facilitates that by encouraging students to make sense of themselves and their place in the world.
Acampora: We are introducing career design and discovery into our undergraduates’ first-year experience. That entails identifying what you care about, what you’re curious about, and connecting those features through reflection and action. It is about exercising human agency.
For example, we offer a class called “Birds Aren’t Real.” The purpose is to explore the characteristics of a conspiracy theory versus an empirically derived theory. We also give all our first-year students a Commonplace Book, which is not a journal but an ancient technique of collecting interesting ideas and mapping out projects; they learn how to catch themselves in important moments that might spur action.
Seneca, the ancient Roman philosopher, counseled gathering as the bee gathers, and then working the gathering, pondering, and digesting, until nectar becomes honey. Nectar spoils in days; honey keeps for millennia. Information and wisdom differ in exactly that way, and the difference is formed, not found.
Jones: That reminds me of Albert Einstein’s comment that the value of a college education is not the learning of many facts, but the training of the mind to think. During these fraught times, how does a humanities education help students find resilience?
Acampora: Critical thinking is a complex nexus of analytical and emotional capabilities – understanding how to change your mind, manage attention and conflict, avoid distraction, deal with uncertainty, and discern ambiguity. Naming where the human value-add lies is critical when machines can replicate routine tasks.
Jones: When competing against thousands of job applicants with similar grades and algorithmic gatekeepers, what should people do to stand out?
Acampora: Employers in 2030 won’t look for humans who behave like AI agents; they’ll hire those who are the most human. Recent data from the New York Fed showed philosophy majors having better employment outcomes than computer scientists. The best investment in education is to become the most human human—a challenging, fulfilling, exciting pursuit that connects us across generations.
Jones: Employers cite empathy, communication, critical thinking, and ethical reasoning as scarce capabilities. Why aren’t they looking to humanities graduates as strategic assets?
Acampora: I sense that hiring criteria are changing. Recent news stories have noted that ideal job candidates in the age of AI need complex emotional intelligence, radical adaptability, and visionary creativity to orchestrate AI tools rather than compete with them. Human agency shows up when measured against artificial intelligence. Education shouldn’t just train students to be prompt engineers for outputs; it must recruit them into their own learning.
Jones: The flip side of uncertainty is wonder. What gives you hope?
Acampora: Being a parent and being surrounded by amazing, curious students gives me hope. While many things change, core truths remain: Things will go wrong, so we need problem-solving; people will live together, so we need collaboration; people will disagree, so we need empathy and conflict resolution; and we need resilience. The humanities prepare us for all of these.
Celia Jones is global chief marketing officer of FINN Partners.
