This week, Al Zambone is deep in the teaching weeds, and we thought we'd bring newer listeners an episode they might have overlooked from our expanding archives.

While this is a show called Historically Thinking, it's put together by people intensely interested (at times self-interestedly so) in the state of higher education. Higher ed is often confusing, perplexing, and anxiety-inducing. Often attempts to explain it are well-intentioned but not well-informed; or they're not particularly well intentioned, and play upon fear–the fear of parents that their children might not have a good job in the future, that they will be financially adrift, that there is the right school or the right major that will guarantee future success.

As a way of providing practical wisdom for the perplexed, at Historically Thinking we're recording podcasts that–if they were lined up on a bookshelf like a leather-bound encyclopedia–could be called "Higher Education: A Guide for the Perplexed." We hope they'll be useful for you.

The first of these shows features Dr. Mike Edmondson is the guest on the show. He's the Associate Vice President of Career Development at Augustana College, and the author of Marketing Your Value: Nine Steps to Navigate Your Career. In the course of the interview, Mike and Al Zambone discuss the current and coming job market; explore why someone who has a doctorate in history cares about career services; and talk about why a liberal arts degree can contribute to getting good jobs, and keeping them. Also, the two of them get their Philadelphia on. Stick' em, Bullies.

 For Further Reading

Michael Edmondson, Marketing Your Value: 9 Steps to Navigate Your Career

Scott Jaschik, "The Liberal Arts and Careers"

Katharine S. Brooks, "Close the Gap Between the Liberal Arts and Career Services"

Plato, Charmides

Tyler Cowen, Average is Over