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A new report by Deloitte Access Economics has provided evidence that the study of the Humanities is valuable to students, employers and society overall.
The report, The Value of the Humanities, was released last week for Macquarie University and states Humanities graduates are ideally placed to help solve global issues facing our world today.
“The challenges arising from prominent global trends, such as managing rapid urbanisation and globalisation, have led to questions about how we could better plan societies that people want to live in, and how we can thrive in a multicultural world that is increasingly interconnected,” the report says.
“These are fundamentally issues of human behaviour and social organisation and interaction. Graduates in the Humanities are well placed to be part of the solution.”
The report also points to the value of Humanities degrees to employers because of the transferrable skills they impart.
It states: “Transferrable skills form the basis of a Humanities education with surveys finding that both undergraduates and postgraduates tend to be more confident in their critical thinking and communication skills relative to those in other fields of education.
“Surveys of employers echoed these findings, with Humanities-educated individuals exhibiting superior transferrable skills such as collaboration and enterprise skills.”
Campion College is Australia’s first tertiary Liberal Arts institute, specialising in the Humanities.
College president Dr Paul Morrissey said the report pinpoints the value and utility of degrees like Campion’s.
“A Liberal Arts or a Humanities degree doesn’t just teach students about history, philosophy or literature, it also ideally teaches students how to think critically, how to approach problems and how to communicate effectively,” Dr Morrissey said.
“It’s fantastic to see this report affirms what we at Campion stand for and have always believed.”
The Deloitte report echoes the findings of another report by Ernst and Young, which stated Australian university leaders estimated 40% of existing degrees will be obsolete within the next decade and that critical thinking, problem-solving and effective communication are more valuable to employers now than they ever have been before.