Challenges to Liberal Arts and Sciences Education: The Bachelor’s Degree and the Shanghai Ranking System

9 AM New York l 2 PM Vienna

 

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The OSUN Liberal Arts and Sciences Collaborative second gathering will be a talk by Samuel Abraham, Executive Director of the European Consortium of Liberal Arts and Sciences (ECOLAS). He will draw upon experiences as a co-founder of ECOLAS to discuss contemporary challenges facing LAS education: the de-emphasis of the bachelor’s degree and the preoccupation with international rankings. This 90-minute event will be conducted as an interactive talk, welcoming frequent audience participation.

Abraham is the rector of the Bratislava International School of Liberal Arts (BISLA), a small liberal arts college in Bratislava, Slovakia. Alongside Hans Adriaansens and Laurent Boetsch, Samuel helped found the ECOLAS in 2007 with the stated mission to “foster and disseminate the good practices necessary to sustain the teaching of the ideals and skills necessary for life-long learning and good citizenship inherent in the tradition of liberal arts and sciences education.”

To this end, ECOLAS has supported the establishment of liberal arts and sciences programs at European universities, by providing advice, service, and partnership opportunities across liberal arts and sciences programs. Abraham is also a founder and editor of the Slovak-English journal Kritika and Kontext, whose most recent issue published the ECOLAS’ 2021 manifesto entitled ‘The Crisis of the Bachelor’s Degree in Europe.’ 

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