[SML] Colleges and the arts

[Dougherty, Jim]

The school in question is SUNY Potsdam, a NY state university in the north country.  Not an “elite” institution, but with good faculty and good students.  In state tuition is about $23,800, including housing and food (tuition only is just over $7K) so it’s reasonable.  There are articles on the issue online if you’re interested in details. They are running a significant deficit and student decline and as part of the SUNY system the decision may be addressing systemic issues as much as ones specific to that school.

I’m coming from a biased perspective as someone who works in college theater, but here are some opinions.  A BA degree in theater is not, primarily, intended as career prep for a life in theater.  It can do that, and has, but learning in a theater environment prepares you for so many careers.  You need to collaborate, communicate, research, meet deadlines, and also develop a broad skillset as well as how to pick up new ones.  How many technicians have learned or taught themselves in college (where the stakes are lower than learning in the job) to be carpenters, painters, riggers, electricians, network engineers and so on?  An actor’s skillset and a lawyer’s can overlap quite a bit as well.  That background can get you in the door in all sorts of fields.  Add to that the exposure to the arts and literature that are unavoidable in theater and a liberal arts education and you have people with skills who are also hopefully well-rounded individuals.

I’m all for vocational education being available and strong – we need it; where I may disagree with some folks is that I don’t think it’s an either/or situation.  Education is vitally important, and there are a lot of forces at work to reduce its value in society as an uneducated populace is handy for a lot of things I don’t agree with.

- Jim Dougherty
Middlebury College Theatre Dept.

P.S. If there are any other Potsdam alums here, please write to the administration and maybe drop a line to the department so that they know you value what they do.  They’re having a rough time as this decision comes on the heels of one reducing their department by about half the positions in this last year.


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