Posted by Kenneth Sloan on October 17, 2002 at 22:56:35:
In Reply to: What music degrees lack? posted by Matt G on October 17, 2002 at 14:24:39:
Do all students who receive music degrees go on to "professional careers"? Should they? Are they failures if they don't?
How about all students who receive Psychology degrees? Do they all go on to careers as professional Psychologists?
Don't Psychology students need courses in Entrepenuership and Marketing? Or are these skills not necessary to a professional Psychology career?
My point is that a "music degree" is not (and should not be) synonymous with "training for a professional career as a musician". And...formal academic degrees are not the only way to learn skills which are useful in the real world.
I'm truly puzzled by the (in my opinion) inordinate emphasis on "job training" that crops up in any discussion of music degrees. It really does seem to be very different from other fields.
In my opinion, a college degree (in any field) offers lots and lots of stuff that will prove useful in a subsequent career - but any student who tries to find an immediate connection between coursework and future career skills is missing the point. I'll go even further and say that any *instructor* who emphasizes this sort of connection is short-changing the students. College programs which make too big a deal of this are (again, my opinion) ones to be avoided.
All right...I'll stop now.