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Aspen Institute Trustee and University of Chicago philosophy professor Mortimer Adler (founder of the National Paideia Center and the Center for the Study of The Great Ideas) wrote on liberal studies forty years ago. In his book, Reforming Education, he says that education is simply a means to achieve an end. And "...the end of liberal education...lies in the use we make of our leisure, in the activities with which we occupy our leisure time." The true opposite of a liberal education is vocational education. The opposite of labor is leisure. So the purpose of a liberal education is not to learn how to earn a living, but to learn how to live and enjoy life, especially when not working. He concludes "...that the mark of happy man (or woman) is also the sure sign that he or she is liberally educated, namely, that you never find him or her trying to kill time." (Adapted from Liberal Studies Program mission statement, California State University, Chico.)
