OP-ED: There’s a Potential Masterpiece in the Blending of Arts and Sciences
By Dr. Mel Schiavelli
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The arts and sciences have so much in common that it strikes me as funny when people think the two are at odds with each other.
Throughout history, many of the great minds in science were also artists. Leonardo da Vinci, who lived more than 500 years ago, has often been described as the archetype of the Renaissance man, a man whose unquenchable curiosity was equaled only by his powers of invention. He is widely considered to be one of the greatest painters of all time and perhaps the most diversely talented person ever to have lived. He is known as a sculptor, architect, engineer, botanist, musician and writer.
Da Vinci is revered for his technological ingenuity too. He conceptualized a helicopter, a tank, concentrated solar power, a calculator, and the double hull vessel, and outlined a rudimentary theory of plate tectonics. Relatively few of his designs were constructed or were even feasible during his lifetime, but as a scientist, da Vinci greatly advanced the state of knowledge in the fields of anatomy, civil engineering, optics, and hydrodynamics.
Da Vinci wasn’t alone. Ernst Haeckel, who lived 100 years ago, was an eminent biologist, naturalist, philosopher, physician, and professor who discovered, described, and named thousands of new species, mapped a genealogical tree relating all life forms, and coined many terms in biology. He was also an accomplished artist who produced hundreds of paintings.
As cofounder of Caltech Jet Propulsion Laboratory in the 1940s, Frank J. Malina conceived and directed the design, construction, and testing of America’s first successful high-altitude sounding rocket. And he was considered one of the great pioneers of light and motion in art.
Da Vinci’s, Haeckel’s, and Malina’s excellence in multiple mediums and disciplines serves as the foundation for the need early in this century to catalyze the next generation.
Another, more contemporary, building block inspiring today’s college and university students is STEM — science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. And with good reason. Competencies in these areas are crucial to fueling economic growth and enabling companies to successfully compete in the knowledge-based global market. In fact, half of the jobs in high-growth industries over the next decade will require STEM education to the bachelor’s level.
But STEM isn’t mutually exclusive. It’s incumbent on educators to encourage and sustain a creative curriculum, too, that blends in the arts and humanities. Too many institutions focus entirely on one at the expense of the other. This is a disservice to not only students but also the nation’s long-term future.
To maximize the potential of the new workforce, educators need to balance science and technology-focused education with the best of the liberal arts, general education, communication, teamwork, and practical application to fully meet the needs of the 21st century business world.
This cross-discipline approach is already taking hold.
· A year after residents at St. Barnabas Medical Center in New Jersey began discussing short stories and poems with medical themes during rounds, patient evaluations of residents improved significantly. Residents are more aware of their patients’ humanity, more willing to inquire about hobbies and families.
· An urban teen empowerment program called the Boston 100K ArtScience Innovation Prize, provides learning opportunities through the development of breakthrough ideas in arts and design at the frontier of scientific knowledge. The founder of this program tailored it from curriculum he developed at Harvard.
· Harrisburg University of Science and Technology’s STEM-focused curriculum includes general education courses on art, media and philosophy such as The Creative Mind, Cinema Studies and The Cultured Mind.
Now more than ever, students need to major in STEM programs. But it’s equally important that literature, music, painting, and other areas of the arts and humanities that foster creativity, imagination, and discovery need to become more prominent in university students’ course loads.
By merging STEM with the creative platform provided by the arts, the students of today and the workforce of tomorrow will be the true artists in framing the success of the 21st century economy.
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Dr. Mel Schiavelli is president of the Harrisburg University of Science and Technology in Harrisburg, PA. The University, which was founded in 2001, is the only STEM-focused comprehensive university between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh.