The Decline of the Humanities Is Not Willful, It’s Just Ignorance

Higher education has seen the fall of the English and History majors by a full third over the past decade – enrollment down by 17%.

That’s according to Robert Townsend, the co-director of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences’ Humanities Indicators project, and the New Yorker article, The End of the English Major.

Instead of pursuing a humanities education – which the National Humanities Center defines as the study of history, modern and ancient languages and literature, and other related fields –  the younger generation is being steered on a STEM-based path in the face of market changes, A.I., legislative support, and data from the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
There is a pattern of low or decreasing proficiency in the subject categories that ties back to the humanities.

The National Assessment of Education Process (NAEP) tests fourth-, eighth-, and 12th-grade students in their knowledge of the three main categories of education: English, math, and science. U.S. history and civics, both related to the humanities, are also tested as subcategories. 

The NAEP examination in U.S. History showed a drop in history achievement from 2014 to 2022 within the eighth-grade demographic. Advanced proficiency dropped to 14%. From 2001-2010, 12th-graders averaged above 55% in the below-basic category.

The NAEP civics subcategory exam tests knowledge, intellectual skills, and dispositions. In 2022, the percentage of eighth graders who earned a score below the basic level was 31%, an increase of four percent from 2018. 

While the scores of 12th-grade students have remained relatively consistent from 1998 to 2010, about a third — largely greater than — the students were below basic achievement. 

These statistics show a pattern of low or decreasing proficiency in subject categories tying back to the humanities in K-12 education.

In California’s high school curricula, while high schoolers have greater freedom in the classes they take to focus on a specific subject, there are still requirements for course subject distribution. There is a graduation requirement that is standardized throughout the state, but the California University Course Requirements — also known as the A-G requirements — serve as a guideline for those who are looking for admission to the UCs and CSUs. The guideline dictates a required three years of college-preparatory mathematics are required, two years of history and/or social science, and two years of science.

Even with these guidelines, enrollment in natural science credits rose by 34% and in math credits by 30% between 2009 and 2019.

AP exams are another piece of evidence for the trend toward greater STEM course participation. Inside many schools, taking APs is by choice as well. Mainly, they count under the elective G requirement — they aren’t required at all under the core curriculum requirement. Still, there is a discrepancy in the distribution of test takers for different exams. In 2022, a combined 110,122 students took the AP Art History and AP European History exams. That same year, AP Calculus AB and AP Physics 1 exams had over 400,000 test takers combined.

Data from the American Academy of Arts and Sciences revealed that in 2019, humanities AP exam test takers were less likely to receive a 4 or 5 than their counterparts. Approximately 28% of exams in the humanities received the higher end of the scores, while more than 40% of the math and science exams test-takers earned a 4 or 5.

In colleges, the distribution of humanities majors saw a significant decline from 2012 to 2022, falling by about a third – from 13.1% to 8.8%, also according to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Noticeably less than the bachelors handed out to science fields at 38%, in 2022.

High school and college trends show a similar message: the humanities have less traction than STEM. 

This trend of decline in the humanities has several factors.

One of them is simply money. Just a few weeks ago, on June 15, the Legislature signed a budget bill for the next fiscal year, with the upcoming budget taking effect on July 1. Currently, there is a $55 billion dollar deficit in the state budget, according to Brian Wheatley, Press Secretary for Senator Josh Newman. 

That means that there’s going to be cuts. Education included.

Under the Prop. 98 budget for the 2024-2025 fiscal year, Governor Newsom proposed $5.5 billion in reductions and other solutions affecting K-12 schools and community colleges, according to the Legislative Analyst’s Office.

“Because no additional alternatives are part of the plan, the proposal would create pressure to reduce spending for state budget priorities outside of K-24 education starting in 2025-26,” analysts from the California Budget and Policy Center wrote. In addition to a drop in the Prop. 98 minimum funding guarantee, they claim.

Another factor in this issue is ignorance — ignorance of the programs available that incorporate the humanities.

Wheatley recalled the District of Choice Program, which allows a student to transfer to a participating school district. With the ability to transfer districts, students can have access to humanities programs they may not have in their own district. What’s stopping the expansion of this program, Wheatley and Senator Dave Min note, is a lack of knowledge about it.

“Not enough people know about them, because in particular high schools you’re at, you’re probably told, ‘Gotta go to college, gotta go to UC or an Ivy League,’” Min said.

Still, there’s a lack of legislation to promote humanities education and programs like District of Choice.

There are bills in the 2023-2024 year that have been signed into law and target STEM programs, like Senate Bill 444 and Assembly Bill 2097. 

Senator Josh Newman, Chair of the Senate Education Committee, was asked in if he was aware of any legislation, either recently introduced or in the approval process, that would balance the disparity between the promotion of STEM and humanities education.

His response: “I’m actually not.”

“In California, we placed, over the last several years, a big emphasis on STEM,” Newman said. “And I think that’s been worthwhile, but there’s the question about ‘What, then, is the role, or the relative weight for the classic humanities education?’”

Over the last decade, there’s been increasing focus on the technology sector, especially in California — home to Silicon Valley. That’s not disconnected from STEM education taking priority over the humanities, Newman said. 

“The perception is the best jobs, the best careers, the most money will come from things like AI, computer science,” he stated. “There’s been kind of a shift away from the humanities, and it’s been largely market-driven.” 

Generative artificial intelligence’s rapid development — faster than anticipated — is also impacting the workforce.

“Those [humanities] jobs, a lot of them may be displaced by AI in the near future, too,” said Min.

Chat- GPT started in late 2022, and in mid-2024, version 5 is anticipated within months. Companies are quickly trying to jump on the AI train. Social media apps, like Instagram and Snapchat, have integrated AI into their platforms. This technology has adapted language models, generated images, and absorbed vast swaths of information accumulated on the internet. 

California’s economy is built up by the arts, including graphic design, and the classic model of Hollywood jobs, notes Newman. Concerns about AI replacement have been circulating within the creative sector in the past year.

In an NBC News article by Daniel Arkin he states, “AI-powered image generators such as DALL-E 2 and Midjourney have rattled people who make visual art for a living.” 

AI was a main aspect of last year’s long WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. How the writers in Hollywood are responding is elaborated on further: “The thousands of unionized scribes who went on strike… are…taking aim at… the rise of generative artificial intelligence like ChatGPT, the AI-powered “chatbot” that has captivated and alarmed people in creative professions in recent months.” 

Min said humanities programs remain important to the workforce, especially as they support students in different career paths. 

“A lot of these different programs are ways to try to level the playing field towards jobs,” he mentioned. “We need to re-emphasize those, but also make sure there are pathways to get jobs.” 

And while there isn’t any current legislation prompting broader support of the humanities passing through the Senate Education Committee, the Joint Committee on the Arts is currently focused on promoting arts education. 

Arts are at times encompassed in a humanities education, too.  

Senator Ben Allen, Vice-Chair of the Joint Committee, is in the process of passing Senate Bill 1341. It seeks to fix the misalignment between the California Education framework and the California Education Code about visual and performing arts. The education code does not define visual and performing arts as included in Media Arts. So the bill seeks to make it clear that those disciplines are inclusive of Media Arts as a type of education eligible to be taught in K-12 schools.

“It’s going to take some time — not all schools are going to jump on board right away,” a staff member from Allen’s office said. “Some frameworks or new schools tend to be slow to adopt them. But I think we’re in that process, and people are recognizing that it, it truly is valuable.”

While people may specialize in other fields, the importance of the humanities is inherent in everyone’s lives; it teaches people the skills of understanding, critical thinking, and reasoning. All of these factors can be applied to anyone’s life, no matter the profession.

And legislators, including Josh Newman, recognize that it’s important not to push humanities education to the sidelines — especially before college. 

“We absolutely should be very focused [in] K-12 on the humanities,” Newman said. “On developing critical thinkers and competent, fully participating citizens.”