History isn't a 'useless' major. It teaches critical thinking, something America needs plenty more of.

Why are college students turning away from studying history as preparation for a future as citizens and workers?

Source: History isn't a 'useless' major. It teaches critical thinking, something America needs plenty more of | LA Times

Unfortunately, history – and other humanities majors – are not being "sold" to students / prospective students (or anyone else, for that matter) because they do not appear to have an immediate, direct "practical" application. The extreme push to channel everyone into "higher education" – regardless of temperament or aptitude – has exacerbated the problem, while cheapening (as I have discussed many times previously) the value of the degree received.

Unfortunately, I fear we are turning out a passel of graduates who may well be prepared to work in the IT, health-care, or other "STEM" fields, but have little-to-no breadth or depth of knowledge in the areas – history, literature, philosophy – that are necessary to function effectively (learning from history in order to make sense of the present and intelligently plan for the future) in the polis: the public square, as citizens of a functioning representative republic.

Trade schools would be the more appropriate venue for those who want skills alone, but a working republic needs a core of critical thinkers, and persons well-grounded in the wisdom and experience of the past. Instead, we are turning out, as others have commented on many occasions and in many fora, a herd of sheep, easily swayed by demagoguery: whether you consider the demagogue in question to be Trump or (for instance) Hogg is immaterial.

Of course, adding to the problem is the fact that, in the words of one commentator, "the history curriculum at most schools [teaches] indoctrination instead of critical thinking." I was fortunate to have received my undergraduate training at a time when, despite inroads from the late '60s, '70s, and early '80s, the humanities were still being taught with a strong sense of passing on worthwhile traditions (and, yes, cautionary lessons) and teaching critical thinking.

That is less true, now... to put it mildly!