Creativity in liberal education before and after study commencement

Abstract

In today’s society, creativity is an important quality. Creativity is defined as the ability to produce something novel and valuable as defined within a social context and it involves skills such as divergent thinking, problem solving and perspective taking. This study assesses the creative potential of students before and after commencement of an interdisciplinary, liberal undergraduate program. In between measurements, students followed a course in connective thinking through creative reading and writing. The results showed that students’ creative potential developed over time. Implications for theory as well as practice are discussed.