Liberal Arts for the 21st Century

Jim White is a passionate and tireless supporter of the enduring value of a broad-based liberal arts education and often gives public talks on the topic. He also believes that diversity, equity and inclusion go hand in hand with what it means to provide an excellent liberal arts education, which values diverse ideas, cultures and perspectives.

White came to Carolina in July 2022 from the University of Colorado Boulder, where he was acting dean of the College of Arts and Sciences for five years and a faculty member in the Department of Geological Sciences for more than 30 years. An internationally recognized expert in climate science, White has published some 200 peer-reviewed journal articles and is a highly cited researcher in the field. He was elected to the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2014. At Carolina, he is a member of the faculty of the Department of Earth, Marine and Environmental Sciences.

In a Q&A, Dean White was asked about how the College of Arts and Sciences is fulfilling Carolina’s mission of teaching, research and public service. White pointed to the new steps the IDEAs in Action curriculum brings to prepare Tar Heels for the modern world.

“Lots of universities emphasize the importance of written communication, but our curriculum recognizes that students need oral and digital communication skills as well. We are emphasizing the listening, rhetoric and discourse skills that allow students to have difficult conversations. We have a required data literacy course to ensure that our students can make sense of the numbers that are thrown at them every day. We are emphasizing experiential education because we know what an effective learning tool that can be.”

Read the full interview with Dean Jim White, Craver Family Dean

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